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Latest Canadian wildfire smoke maps show where air quality is unhealthy now and forecasts for the near future
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Smoke from the wildfires raging in Canada have affected parts of the U.S. and satellite images from NASA show the smoke has even traveled across the Atlantic to Europe. Here is the expected forecast for the smoke.
On Tuesday, parts of the Midwest saw very unhealthy levels of smoke, with Chicago, Milwaukee and Detroit experiencing some of the worst air quality in the world, according to IQ Air, which monitors the air quality index around the world,
Areas to the East and South of these cities had moderate air quality on Tuesday and Wednesday, according to AirNow, a government site that measures air quality.
The smoke is traveling along the jet stream, a pattern of wind that flows from west to east.
An interactive map from NOAA shows the dense smoke swirling across the U.S. and flowing both southeast across Pennsylvania toward Washington, D.C. and north toward Buffalo on Wednesday into Thursday. Less dense smoke is also seen also traveling toward more eastern cities like Philadelphia and New York.
On Wednesday morning, Pittsburgh was at a purple or very unhealthy air quality level, according to AirNow. The sky turned hazy Wednesday morning and an air quality alert was in effect until midnight.
National Weather Service Baltimore-Washington said a shift to northwesterly winds would bring haze from the wildfire smoke on Wednesday, and issued an air quality alert for all of Maryland, the Washington D.C. metro area and parts of Northern Virginia. The area had yellow, or moderate, air quality on Wednesday, according to AirNow.
Buffalo was at a red or unhealthy level Wednesday, as westerly neighbors like Detroit stayed purple, or very unhealthy. “Looking further west, worse conditions are in place and will make its way across the region today into Thursday,” according to NWS Buffalo.
The New York Department of Health said there was a “potential for temporary spikes in Air Quality Index levels to reach ‘Very Unhealthy’ or ‘Hazardous,'” on Wednesday. Gov. Kathy Hochul issued air quality health advisories for western and central New York and Eastern Lake Ontario on Tuesday and urged people in the state to take precautions as the smoke continued to spread through Thursday.
NASA said Monday the smoke from Canada had spread across the Atlantic to southwestern Europe. Images from NASA’s Terra satellite show smoke over Portugal and Spain, but NASA said it has spread even further.
Smoke from wildfires has traveled in this way before. In 2017, NASA said smoke from West Coast wildfires traveled 3,000 miles to the East Coast.
In 2020, smoke from the massive brushfires in Australia circled the globe, passing South America and reaching back to Australia where they originated, according to NASA.
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