Poor air quality will continue through Friday in the D.C. region courtesy of the smoke from the wildfire ravaging parts of Canada. With “unsafe” and “unhealthy” air posing a threat, here’s what you need to know.
Poor air quality will continue through Friday in the D.C. region courtesy of the smoke from the wildfire ravaging parts of Canada. With “unsafe” and “unhealthy” air posing a threat, here’s what you need to know.
Health experts and meteorologists urge everyone, especially people with asthma, heart disease and respiratory issues, as well as older adults, to stay indoors.
In Northern Virginia, Thursday’s air quality index, or AQI, is forecast at an unhealthy level — 156 — the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality said. The D.C. Department of Energy and Environment predicts the same unhealthy levels for Thursday.
A Code Red Air Quality Alert has also been issued for Maryland’s suburbs to the north of D.C.
AQI describes how clean the air is and what health effects may be expected. A satisfactory AQI is between 0 to 50, which means air pollution “poses little or no risk,” according to AirNow.
Stay inside
“The best thing to do right now is to stay indoors,” Dr. Rachel Schreiber, an allergist with a practice in Rockville, Maryland, told WTOP.
Wednesday’s poor air equality led to the cancellation of all outdoor programming at Prince George’s County Park and Recreation, which extends through Thursday.
ALERT: All outdoor programming for Wednesday, June 7, and Thursday, June 8 is canceled due to unhealthy air quality.
Visit https://t.co/d0g7dzF6lA for updates on outdoor programming.— Parks & Recreation (@pgparks) June 7, 2023
Montgomery County Parks’ Pride in the Parks scheduled for Thursday has also been canceled.
Where did this smog come from?
The smog that has been blanketing the northeastern U.S. came from wildfire smoke in several Canadian provinces, The Associated Press reported.
Much of the air was in the “unhealthy or worse categories in areas from the mid-Atlantic through the Northeast and parts of the Upper Great Lakes,” according to an advisory issued by the Environmental Protection Agency Wednesday night.
“The fires are so big and so hot. They generate a special kind of cloud; we call it pyrocumulus,” University of Maryland atmospheric and oceanic scientist Russell Dickerson told WTOP. “The air, full of smoke, rises up high in the atmosphere, where it has a longer lifetime and can get caught on rivers of wind and transported to long distances.”
The last time at least a code red was issued for D.C. was in July 2018 due to ozone, 7News meteorologist Veronica Johnson said. And the last time the particulate matter (PM) was this high was in 2003.
So far in 2023, there have been six code orange days, which is double than all of 2022 with just three days, Johnson said.
“We remain very dry across the DMV with moderate drought conditions observed,” Johnson said.
Dickerson said the dry weather in much of the Northeast “exacerbates the problem.”
“If it rained, in Quebec, or even between Quebec and us, you wouldn’t see this kind of a haze layer,” Dickerson said.
Forecast
There is a highly isolated chance for a brief shower Thursday or Friday, as an upper-level low spins overhead.
The next best chance for rain arrives Monday with the next weather maker, which will also bring an increase in humidity,
- THURSDAY: Hazy sun. Stray afternoon shower. Highs in the upper 70s.
- FRIDAY: Hazy sun. Stray afternoon shower. Highs in the upper 70s.
Current weather
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