The Smoke, Clouds, and Radiation--Brazil (SCAR-B) field experiment was conducted in central Brazil and southern Amazonia during the period August 15 to September 20, 1995. This paper presents an overview of atmospheric conditions during the SCAR-B period. A meteorological office was established in Brasilia to support the mission flights and field activities. All the meteorological data collected during the SCAR-B have been archived and are available to the scientific community. The meteorological conditions throughout the SCAR-B period of August and September 1995 were near climatological conditions. Few synoptic-scale waves traveling from southeastern Pacific reached Brazil, therefore the SCAR-B period was characterized by long periods of low humidity, dryness, little cloudiness, or rain, and haze events. The stable situation was interrupted due to the penetration of a frontal system on September 20, 1995, and a second and more rain-producing one on September 28, 1995. Those two frontal systems in a period of 10 days brought an end to the dry season. Air particle trajectories show that most of the smoke below 4 km from Amazonia was transported to the south and then to the east exiting the continent at 25 ¿S--30 ¿S. Radiative transfer calculations carried out for the clear sky gaseous and aerosol atmosphere show the decrease of the solar radiation absorption in the atmosphere-surface system due to smoke aerosol loading at the value from 5 to 50 W m-2 depending on the aerosol optical thickness, single-scattering albedo, and solar zenith angle. ¿ 1998 American Geophysical Union