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The public is invited to an open day at the Salina Regional Airport this morning to learn the details of a joint scientific mission among the world's first space and weather agencies to be headquartered in Salina.
The smoke from forest fires in the western United States and agricultural fires in the southern United States has become an increasingly serious problem with regard to air quality, which affects the public.
The FIREX-AQ (Influence of Fires on Regional and Global Environments) Airborne Campaign, conducted jointly by NASA and NOAA, will conduct missions from Salina starting this week to collect measurements from aircraft , satellites and ground instruments based on emissions from forest fires and prescribed fires.
The severity of recent forest fires and the frequency of agricultural fires have made it urgent to conduct smoke – related air quality research. Field airborne field studies have demonstrated the ubiquitous nature of biomass smoke in the atmosphere, but fire emission data from agricultural sources are poorly represented in emission inventories. .
The second part of FIREX-AQ will look at smoke from agricultural burns in the south, with flights departing from the Salina Regional Airport from the end of August. Each year, hundreds of agricultural fires occur near population centers, but their relatively small size means that they are often not detected by satellites that serve as a basis for estimates of smoke emissions. The first part of the campaign began in July with flights departing from Boise, Idaho.
Scientists will use FIREX-AQ data to understand the influence of fuel and fire conditions at the flashpoint on the chemistry of smoke, what happens when it enters the atmosphere, and how the chemical transformation of smoke affects the quality of lesser measure – downwind time.
During the FIREX-AQ phase in Salina, researchers will focus on smoke plumes from agricultural fires and fires in the south and south-east to better understand their composition and effects on the quality of the air.
NASA's DC-8 laboratory aircraft will be based at Salina Regional Airport and will participate in the final phase of the study.
The public is invited to an open house to learn more about the project, see some of the science material and meet some of the participants. A FIREX-AQ open house for the local community is planned today. It will be held at 11am at the Salina Regional Airport, Hangar 600, 2720 Arnold Ct.
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