RP: Smoke From NJ Fire on Radar, Satellite

Blog reader Phil points out that the smoke from the impressive fire near Atlantic City, New Jersey is visible on both the satellite photos and radar this afternoon. At 2:30 PM today, the smoke was very impressive, and had spiked up to 50 dBZ on the radar scope. Here's a look at both from AccuWeather.com RadarPlus:

It was especially impressive in comparison to the line of severe storms pressing eastward through eastern Maryland and Pennsylvania (click to enlarge image above). The smoke plume on satellite made NOAA's OSEI Image of the Day site yesterday, but it wasn't until this morning that the smoke showed up on radar (download a radar loop of the smoke plume from RadarPlus). A close-up zoom of the radar from 2:30 below shows the plume of smoke over Manahawkin, Barnegat and Forked River, NJ:

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As of 2 PM, NewsDay.com gave these stats: The fire started Tuesday, so far 13,500 acres have burned, and 2,500 people have been evacuated. I know we have a lot of readers from New Jersey, so snap a picture of the smoke plume if you can, and upload it to our Photo Gallery.