Long range transport of Canadian wildfire smoke to Europe in 2023: aerosol properties and spectral features of smoke particles
6 affiliations
- 1Physikalisch-Meteorologisches Observatorium Davos, World Radiation Center, Davos, 7260, Switzerland
- 2now at: Oak Ridge Associated Universities, Oak Ridge, 37830, United States and Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, 20771, United States
- 3PSI Center for Energy and Environmental Sciences, 5232 Villigen PSI, Switzerland
- 4Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology, MeteoSwiss, Payerne, 1530, Switzerland
- 5Applied Physics Department, University of Granada, Granada, 18071, Spain
- 6Environmental Remote Sensing Laboratory, EPFL, Lausanne, 1015, Switzerland
Abstract
Canadian wildfires in Fall of 2023 were unique regarding the observed aerosol properties using remote sensing and in situ measurements for both short-range and long-range transported plumes across North America and Europe. One of the highlights was the observation of special concave spectral curvature in AOD having maxima at higher wavelengths than the minimum measured wavelength which led to negative values of Ångström exponent in spectral ranges below 500 nm. Along with this, large accumulation mode size distributions with volume median diameters reaching about 800 nm were observed. Another unique observation was the non-monotonic spectral curvature in single scattering albedo (SSA). For most of the stations, SSA increased in the UV-Visible region and/or further remaining either constant or decreasing at longer wavelengths as observed from retrievals from column integrated (AOD) from remote sensing and coefficients from in situ measurements. Additionally, two stations in Canada and one in Europe were found to have a well-defined peak in AOD at 500 nm. These Canadian stations also displayed a non-monotonic spectral SSA with maxima at 675 nm, while the high altitude stations of Europe showed monotonically increasing SSA. Finally, a much higher (approximately 5 times) UV absorption than visible absorption indicated the presence of brown carbon and/or tar balls, which have a strong spectral dependence in imaginary refractive index. The SSA concave spectral curvature denotes the mix of black carbon and non-absorbing particulate matter and influence of particle size, while the AOD concave spectral curvature is attributed to particle size.
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BibTeX
@article{masoom2026long,
title = {{Long range transport of Canadian wildfire smoke to Europe in 2023: aerosol properties and spectral features of smoke particles}},
author = {Akriti Masoom and Stelios Kazadzis and Robin Lewis Modini and Martin Gysel Beer and Jülian Gröbner and Martine Collaud Coen and Francisco Navas-Guzmán and Natalia Kouremeti and Benjamin Tobias Brem and Nora Nowak and Giovanni Martucci and Maxime Hervo and Sophie Erb},
journal = {Atmospheric chemistry and physics},
year = {2026},
month = aug,
doi = {10.5194/acp-26-10801-2026},
url = {https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-26-10801-2026},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Long range transport of Canadian wildfire smoke to Europe in 2023: aerosol properties and spectral features of smoke particles
AU - Akriti Masoom
AU - Stelios Kazadzis
AU - Robin Lewis Modini
AU - Martin Gysel Beer
AU - Jülian Gröbner
AU - Martine Collaud Coen
AU - Francisco Navas-Guzmán
AU - Natalia Kouremeti
AU - Benjamin Tobias Brem
AU - Nora Nowak
AU - Giovanni Martucci
AU - Maxime Hervo
AU - Sophie Erb
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/08/04
JO - Atmospheric chemistry and physics
DO - 10.5194/acp-26-10801-2026
UR - https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-26-10801-2026
AB - Canadian wildfires in Fall of 2023 were unique regarding the observed aerosol properties using remote sensing and in situ measurements for both short-range and long-range transported plumes across North America and Europe. One of the highlights was the observation of special concave spectral curvature in AOD having maxima at higher wavelengths than the minimum measured wavelength which led to negative values of Ångström exponent in spectral ranges below 500 nm. Along with this, large accumulation mode size distributions with volume median diameters reaching about 800 nm were observed. Another unique observation was the non-monotonic spectral curvature in single scattering albedo (SSA). For most of the stations, SSA increased in the UV-Visible region and/or further remaining either constant or decreasing at longer wavelengths as observed from retrievals from column integrated (AOD) from remote sensing and coefficients from in situ measurements. Additionally, two stations in Canada and one in Europe were found to have a well-defined peak in AOD at 500 nm. These Canadian stations also displayed a non-monotonic spectral SSA with maxima at 675 nm, while the high altitude stations of Europe showed monotonically increasing SSA. Finally, a much higher (approximately 5 times) UV absorption than visible absorption indicated the presence of brown carbon and/or tar balls, which have a strong spectral dependence in imaginary refractive index. The SSA concave spectral curvature denotes the mix of black carbon and non-absorbing particulate matter and influence of particle size, while the AOD concave spectral curvature is attributed to particle size.
SN - 1680-7316
SN - 1680-7324
ER -