File:Western Canada Continues to Burn (MODIS).jpg

English: Raging fires continued to fill the skies of southern Canada and the northern United States with smoke in mid-May 2023. The fires had scorched 478,000 hectares (1,800 square miles) in Alberta, British Columbia, and Saskatchewan, as of May 16, which is 10-times the average area burned for this time of year.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite acquired a true-color image of the continuing conflagrations on May 16. Dozens of active fires are marked in red and plumes of gray smoke can be seen pouring from them. Smoke has risen high in the atmosphere to form a massive river of smoke which is traveling eastward and dips south to impact northern North Dakota and Minnesota.

As of the evening of May 16, there were 89 wildland fires burning in Alberta, a quarter of which were classified as out of control, meaning the fires were expected to grow in size. A majority of the 478,000 hectares burned in mid-May 2023 have been in Alberta, according to the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System, but several fires were classified as burning out of control on that day in British Columbia and Saskatchewan.