May 28

Still under attack from the humid air but not as bad as yesterday. Dewpoints finally below 40 F. Thunderstorms again were fired up from the moisture and instability by the afternoon. No precipitation on campus but some toward the west and over the Sacramento mountains to the east. MODIS morning image from Terra showed building convection early in the day, first up north then down south.



MODIS morning view showed some elevated AOD in the south. However visibility was pretty good this afternoon. Afternoon MODIS AOD not useful.



The elevated AOD may be from smoke from burning in the Gila based on the NOAA HMS smoke and fire map (below).

Evening thunderstorm activity still has the possibility for stirring up dust down south particularly during short lived outflow.


Seeing high PM10 and PM2.5 at Sunland Park Desert View site and somewhat at Anthony. Surprisingly not at Sunland Park City Yard. Based on the 2009 study there were episodes where Desert View was impacted more then the sites further east in Sunland Park.

Ozone was elevated along the border with the Santa Teresa site winning with the highest hourly ozone at 72 ppb at 3 pm. The other Sunland Park sites reached 69 ppb. The EPA AirNow showed a yellow area in this region in the afternoon.