A FINE-PARTICLE SODIUM TRACER FOR LONG-RANGE TRANSPORT OF THE KUWAITIOIL-FIRE SMOKE

Evidence for long-range transport of the Kuwaiti oil-fire smoke during the months following the Persian Gulf War has been more or less indir ect. For example, high concentrations of aerosol particles containing soot and oil-combustion tracers such as vanadium observed at great dis tances from the Middle East may have come from sources other than the oil fires. However, more-recent data on the aerosol chemistry of Kuwai ti oil-fire plumes provides a direct link between those fires and aero sols collected at the Mauna Loa observatory (MLO) during the late spri ng and summer of 1991. By itself, temporal covariation of fine-particl e concentrations of elemental carbon, sulfur, and the noncrustal V/Zn ratio in MLO aerosols suggested a link to large-scale oil-combustion s ources, but not necessarily to Kuwait. However, high concentrations of fine-particle (0.1-1.0 mum diameter) NaCl were observed in the ''whit e'' oil-fire plumes over Kuwait during the summer of 1991. Further ana lysis of the Mauna Loa data indicates strong temporal correspondence b etween the noncrustal V/Zn and noncrustal Na/Zn ratios and strong cons istency between the noncrustal Na to noncrustal V ratios found at Maun a Loa and in the Kuwaiti oil-fire plume. In the absence of other demon strable sources of fine-particle Na, these relationships provide a dir ect link between the Kuwaiti oil fires and aerosol composition observe d at MLO.