Smoke plumes over southwest Siberia

Smoke plumes over southwest Siberia Today’s Image of the Day from NASA Earth Observatory shows smoke from a large number of fires burning in the Omsk region of southwest Siberia. 

With a population of more than one million people, Omsk is one of the ten largest cities in Russia. It is also one of the coldest cities, averaging around -4 degrees Fahrenheit in the winter.

Smoke plumes over southwest Siberia The area around Omsk is one of the most productive agricultural regions in Russia, with some of the main crops including wheat, rye, barley, and oats. Before replanting each year in the spring, farmers burn debris from the previous year’s crop to clear the land and fertilize the soil. Siberia is an extensive geographical region spanning much of Northern Asia. Siberia has been part of modern Russia since the latter half of the 16th century. Novosibirsk is the center of the Siberian Federal District since May 13, 2000. The territory of Siberia extends eastwards from the Ural Mountains to the watershed between the Pacific and Arctic drainage basins. The river Yenisey conditionally divides Siberia into two parts, Western and Eastern. Siberia stretches southwards from the Arctic Ocean to the hills of north-central Kazakhstan and to the national borders of Mongolia and China. In Russia the Eastern part of the country is not viewed as Siberia. The eastern region of Russia next to Siberia was historically called the Far Eas

This year, Russian emergency services have reported an abnormally high number of fires in the Omsk region. 

According to NASA, wildfire smoke has traveled about 400 miles east toward Novosibirsk, where a “black sky” air quality warning was issued on April 27.

The image was captured on April 28, 2021 by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite.

Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory 

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By Chrissy Sexton, Earth.com Staff Writer