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It does seem to be improving modestly, particularly to our NE. DCA vis back up to 2.5mi - PHL is 6mi and the NYC area is no longer reporting "smoke".

Found a link with visible band optical depth. UMBC at ~2.5 and the Maryland science center at ~3. Those are pretty ridiculous.

Yeah time is probably going to be one of the biggest factors here. If it can remain over the Gulf and head west, rather than getting caught up quickly and turned into FL, it should have a window for genesis.

28 @ the fake hollow in CT (probably)

N95 should help, yes.

Will the tropical system off the west coast of Florida manage to organize despite moderate northerly wind shear over the next few days? It's expected to spend three to five days over the very warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, which suggests we shouldn't count this system out. While a weaker system is the most likely scenario, there is the potential for a stronger system if it continues moving west under strong central/southeast US ridging and doesn't turn quickly northward toward Florida. https://hurricanehacker.substack.com/p/tricky-forecast-for-gulf-of-mexico

Got a little area of convection off the FL coast. Could become the seedling for our weekend low.

Does a N95 even help with smoke? I've definitely exhaled smoke into a N95 and it came right out. I've got to wear a mask anyway because of the job im doing. Just curious. Remember the virus debit in 2020? Lol

Bump for the 12z isolated micro-shower tomorrow in the metro area

There it is. Yuck. "Very unhealthy for the general population"

Entire basin looks pretty favorable for development into August. Makes sense with the Hadley cell out in the central pacific. While I think the Eastern Pacific has the highest chance of above normal ACE due to the +PMM you mentioned, I think the basin as a whole has a chance to be above normal in all 3 regions.

New AQ alert levels for MD.

Yeah I don’t think it’ll be as bad as forecast today

I think this would be a good call but I’m doubting it happens. Unfortunately (or fortunately) I need to work my real job Saturday morning so I’ll be spared the smoke.

Happy they made the right call for you! I may not know until later today. So far games are still on as scheduled.

This is the most wildfire smoke I have seen here.

It sucked, but was kind of awesome. A freaking smoke haboob.

This actually helps a lay person like myself understand this. Thank you!

Wanted to ask you or other Mets if the CSL (swim league) should consider moving divisionals, our league wide qualifying meet for all stars, to Sunday. Warmups start 6am and meet starts 8am, ends by 12pm. @NorthArlington101 if you have any thoughts lmk.

Certainly may be a brief window for something to become a bit organized before shear increases some

After dropping the signal briefly, AI ensembles in particular are a little more bullish on some development.

Understanding smokes impact on convective potential is extremely complicated. If you're talking about convective potential which is extremely dependent on instability, then smoke is going to have a large negative impact on convective potential because its going to inhibit the convective temperature from being reached and of course lead to a reduction in instability. If you have a setup though in which forcing and dynamics are strong and you don't have to rely on large CAPE, smoke is probably not going to inhibit convection from developing (but of course may negatively impact strength). In the case of what happened across western Maine the other day, you already had capping in place from a stout EML so the dense smoke further enhanced capping and of course prevented convective temperature from being reached. Forcing for any afternoon storm development was always weak, which also increased tornado potential. So adding smoke into things just add another level of complexity but the impact of smoke on potential is going to vary based on the mechanisms involved in convective development.

A lot less smoky out there today. I can even see some blue in the sky. Looking forward to this crap being gone by tomorrow afternoon.

We got "upgraded" to Code Purple AQI fwiw

Double hits rarely occur but there is enough forcing tomorrow even with the 1st round early afternoon I like the chances of seeing a 2nd round later in the evening.