PALMDALE, Calif. (AP) — A NASA research jet is scheduled to make low-level flights over parts of California to sample air.
NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center says the passes over the San Joaquin Valley and the Los Angeles Basin will occur Thursday.
The aircraft will fly at altitudes between 1,500 feet and 3,500 feet (457.2 meters and 1,066.8 meters).
The four-engine DC-8 has spent the last two months researching the life cycle of smoke from fires in the U.S. and will conduct the California sampling while flying from Salina, Kansas, to its home base at Palmdale in the Mojave Desert north of Los Angeles.
The air samples will be analyzed by UC Irvine researchers to provide information to the California Air Resources Board.