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The smoke from Canadian wildfires continued to get worse through Wednesday afternoon and blew away previous air quality index records dating back to 1980.
How long will wildfire smoke last in N.J.? When will skies clear? Forecast update. Greg Pope, a professor of earth and environmental science at Montclair State University, said this event is unusual, not just for New Jersey, but even compared to other states where expansive wildfires are more frequent.
”I’ve been talking with my colleagues out west and, you know, people in California or Colorado, they do experience fires regularly. And if you’re near a fire, you get the heavy smoke situation,” Pope said “But they’re nearby, they’re within miles or tens of miles from a fire. Our case here is unusual in that were hundreds or maybe thousands of miles from the fires.” The air conditions cast a hazy, ominous overcast pall across the state. When the air quality index pushes into unhealthy and hazardous levels, it affects all residents, not just those with respiratory concerns. A number of factors play into the air quality index, including the amount of ozone and carbon dioxide in the air, but this week’s elevated levels can be attributed almost entirely to the wildfires in Canada, experts said. The direction of the wind flow from Canada is to blame for the wildfire smoke reaching New Jersey, said Ben Charles, lead meteorologist at WeatherWorks. South flowing winds are carrying the smoke from the massive wildfires in southeast Canada and the Quebec area down into the northeastern United States, Charles said. Had the winds flowed northwards, the smoke would not have touched New Jersey and the air quality would have remained in a healthy zone. “It doesn’t take a lot of a lot of air to kind of keep lofted, it just gets caught up in the lower level winds,” Dodd said. Air quality is measured through the air quality index, also known as AQI. The Environmental Protection Agency measures five major air pollutants to create six levels of concern. The higher the AQI the more unhealthy the air quality gets. In general, people should stay indoors as much as they can while keeping windows and vents closed. Outdoor strenuous activity should be avoided, too, and those with respiratory or pulmonary issues should be extra cautious. Many schools are held recess indoors, canceled class trips and kept students inside all day. Khalil Savary, a pediatric pulmonologist at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, said the air is as unhealthy as it’s been in a long time. “Particle air pollution in New Jersey and across the region has reached levels not seen in many years,” Savary said .“Surgical masks, cloth masks, and ill-fitting N95 masks are not effective protective equipment,” he said. Windows and vents should also be closed to prevent outside air from entering homes, Savary said.
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