Welcome to smoke.alaska.edu!

PLEASE NOTE: The 2024 Alaska wildfire season ended. There was a total of 390 wildfires during the 2024 fire season in Alaska. A number of 209 fires were human caused, 179 were sparked by lighting, and two had undetermined causes. The total area burned amounts to 667 064.8 acres. The vast majority (>99%) of the burned acreage was the result of lightning sparked fires. UAFSMOKE wildfire smoke forecasts will resume in spring 2025.

The Weather Research and Forecasting model with inline Chemistry and fire plume rise dynamics (WRF/Chem) is used as core model to forecast the atmospheric dispersion of smoke downstream from Alaska wildfires. Forecasts for up to 72 hours are updated daily with current fire and weather information.

UAFSMOKE is an initiative supported by the Alaska Climate Research Center at the Geophysical Institute of the University of Alaska Fairbanks in cooperation with colleagues from NOAA's Global System Division, Brazil's Center for Weather Forecasting and Climate Studies (CPTEC/INPE), and the USFS Missoula Fire Sciences Lab.