[HN Gopher] British Columbia declares a state of emergency amid ...
___________________________________________________________________
British Columbia declares a state of emergency amid devastating
wildfires
Author : abhayhegde
Score : 88 points
Date : 2023-08-19 17:02 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.washingtonpost.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.washingtonpost.com)
| grecy wrote:
| The capital city of the Northwest Territories, Yellowknife, is
| also under a full evacuation order.
|
| That is 62 degrees from the equator, 20,000 people.
|
| Air quality in much of Western Canada is horrific.
| reilly3000 wrote:
| I was in Nelson BC for the past couple of days. AQI was in the
| 200's most of the time, the red was shining a reddish hue.
| Kelowna is in great danger and US side was worse, with the city
| of Medical Lake having been completely destroyed today. The
| interstate is closed and lots of ranch animals had to be let
| loose and are wandering about.
| xrd wrote:
| I was born almost fifty years ago in Oregon. Growing up I never
| remember another event like the fires of 2020. Is this just me
| misremembering? Is there something fundamentally different about
| the smoke now compared to then? Was it all heightened three years
| ago because of social media and wouldn't have been as impactful
| in the newspaper era? Do any other Pacific Northwest natives
| recall smoke like there is lately? I'm reading a lot of the
| comments and believe that this isn't the worst of the last forty
| years but my memory tells me differently and I'm wondering how I
| could be so off.
| elihu wrote:
| I don't think we've had anything like the 2020 fires in a long
| time (though the 2017 Gorge fire was pretty bad). Maybe the
| Tillamook burn was comparable?
|
| Field burning used to be a more common thing though, so it was
| a regular annual occurrence that you'd have a lot of smoke in
| the air during field burning season.
| karaterobot wrote:
| I've lived in Seattle for 25-30 years, and I think prior to the
| last ~5 years, the smoke from wildfires making it to the city
| was a much more rare event. Maybe once every few years, rather
| than every year. And it didn't last nearly as long, nor was
| there as much smoke.
| jjulius wrote:
| Native of 30+ years. The last ~5 years are absolutely an
| anomaly.
|
| They've always been present, yes, especially towards the
| eastern side of the Cascades, but the past few years have felt
| like a different beast.
| soupbowl wrote:
| I am in between a few of the fires in southern bc. My friends are
| mostly evacuated with a few on alert. Yesterday was scary because
| of high winds, houses have been lost. Today the air quality is
| terrible, my deck furniture was covered in ash this morning.
|
| Fire here has always been common, the most common pine tree
| requires fire to open it's pine cones. Fires starting here always
| sparks climate change battles. The reality is that there has and
| will always be fire here.
| swader999 wrote:
| Decades of crappy fuel management and cancelling their rapid
| attack helicopter crews didn't help.
| jml7c5 wrote:
| I believe it was Alberta that ended rapattack, not BC.
| swader999 wrote:
| They both did.
| [deleted]
| soupbowl wrote:
| I am a logger that actually did fuel management in these
| specific areas, it is a very important thing that politics has
| made a mess of. That being said it has nothing to do with what
| is happening here right now.
|
| Some of the places burning are places fuel management has been
| done and some of these places already burned up a few times
| over the last 10 years.
|
| Also helicopters are not our problem heavy winds was grounding
| them anyways.
| swader999 wrote:
| Appreciate your comment. At the moment wind is wreaking havoc
| but these fires were small for several days before they grew
| this large. A quick reaction would have saved so much effort
| and expense and grief.
| voisin wrote:
| What do you think of the Stop the Spray BC movement? Sounds
| like they've been using herbicides to kill broadleaf trees
| which are important for fire breaks.
| cf100clunk wrote:
| Earlier comments contain some good links to current situational
| info, so I'm tossing these online wildfire map links into the
| mix:
|
| Canada:
|
| BC Wildfire Service's Wildfire Map:
| https://wildfiresituation.nrs.gov.bc.ca/map
|
| BC Air Quality Health Index:
| https://www.env.gov.bc.ca/epd/bcairquality/readings/find-sta...
|
| NWT Live Fire Map:
| https://www.gov.nt.ca/ecc/en/services/wildland-fire-update/n...
|
| Alberta Wildfire Map:
| https://www.arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/3ffcc2d0ef3e4e0999b0c...
|
| USA:
|
| WA & OR Fire Map: https://gacc.nifc.gov/nwcc/firemap.php
|
| ID Fire Map: https://idfg.idaho.gov/ifwis/maps/realtime/fire/
| matrix_overload wrote:
| For anyone getting an emotional response and willing to blame
| climate change deniers, here's some dry government statistics on
| Canadian forest fires [0].
|
| The number of fires over the past 4 decades is trending down. The
| numbers for area burned looks like each time there's a peak, it
| burns out enough fuel to make subsequent years easier. There were
| a couple of peaks in 1980s/1990s, but nothing that big recently.
|
| Also, notably, the area burnt is lowest during recession years
| and COVID lockdown year. So when people could not afford to go
| camping/ATVing, the amount of fires was drastically less. Climate
| change probably does play some role here, but so does the 20%
| population increase in BC over the last 2 decades.
|
| So, the correct question to ask is "what can we do as a
| reasonable trade-off to reduce the number of fires in the future
| without compromising the quality of life?". And the correct
| answer is "educate people on how to spot hazardous terrain and
| contain the fires they accidentally started". Requiring fire
| extinguishers at campsites/ATVs could help. Doing some training
| would help. Doing controlled burns would help. Renaming
| Environment Canada to "Environment and Climate Change Canada| and
| closing down local production in favor of Chinese imports won't.
|
| [0] https://cwfis.cfs.nrcan.gc.ca/ha/nfdb
| deanCommie wrote:
| Counterpoint: "The 2023 wildfire season is now B.C.'s most
| destructive on record -- and it's only mid-July"
|
| The four worst forest fire seasons in BC since 1950 by square
| kilometers burnt are 2023, 2018, 2017, and 2021 in that order.
|
| [0] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/bc-
| wildfire-...
| bparsons wrote:
| The entire province is on fire. It has barely rained in the
| southern half of the province since April. It is climate
| change.
| matrix_overload wrote:
| Which is fairly consistent with other El Nino years [0]
|
| [0] https://vancouver.weatherstats.ca/charts/precipitation-
| month...
| goatlover wrote:
| You know this is the same sort of fallacious reasoning the
| deniers make when they say it's been usually cold and snowy
| in their part of the world? You need to show there's a link
| between the lack of rain and the province being on fire. Is
| there historical precedence for these kinds of dry periods
| and fires?
| gravitronic wrote:
| There is simple physics: warmer air holds more moisture,
| pulling it from the ground and holding it longer. Explains
| drier conditions and more extreme rainfalls when they do
| occur
| swader999 wrote:
| Climate change is supposed to bring more rainfall though.
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| A couple years ago we had a major flood event which still
| hasn't been fully recovered from, so... Maybe that
| qualifies as more rainfall.
| yongjik wrote:
| The graph shown in the link ends at 2021, with was apparently a
| somewhat bad year but not horrible, with 4 million hectares
| burned. Clearly, there were worse years in the past, like 1989
| or 1995, when more then 7 million hectares were burned.
|
| Since 1996 no year had more than 5M hectares burned, and the
| graph (if you squint enough) does look like it's slightly
| trending down.
|
| Except, enter 2023 [1]:
|
| > As of August 17, 5,765 fires had burned 13,749,167 hectares
| (33,974,932 acres), about four percent of the entire forest
| area of Canada and more than five times the long-term average
| of 2.38 million ha (5.9 million acres) for that time of the
| year.
|
| Want to see what an updated graph looks like? Found one here
| [2] - scroll down to the bottom.
|
| It seems misleading to cite a graph ending at 2021 when we're
| seeing the graph shooting off the chart right in front of us.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Canadian_wildfires
|
| [2] https://ciffc.net/statistics
| matrix_overload wrote:
| 2023 is a first El Nino year after a long streak of La Nina
| years [0]. Which means, drier-than-usual summer after
| multiple wetter-than-usual summers. If we assume that wetter
| years accumulate the fuel, and drier years burn it, it would
| explain a single peak in 2023 followed by lower-than-average
| years later.
|
| [0] https://ggweather.com/enso/oni.htm
| yongjik wrote:
| Except that the very graph in your link shows 2023 as an
| unremarkable year. "El Nino after a few years of La Nina"
| practically happens every decade or so. Similar thing
| happened in 2002 and 2009: 2002 was an average fire year
| and 2009 was close to minimal fire.
| [deleted]
| swader999 wrote:
| Too soon for El Nino to be a factor.
| libraryatnight wrote:
| [flagged]
| ggdG wrote:
| > I don't understand your goal. Why are you doing this sort
| of comment? Taking the time to dull peoples minds against
| whats happening to the world?
|
| > Is it for yourself? Are you scared and it makes you feel
| better to try and control other peoples' perceptions and
| reactions? Do you believe you're doing a service and creating
| a nuanced worldview that helps people make better decisions?
| You're not. I don't understand you.
|
| > Are you in a position that this com ment is useful? Is this
| a place where it is useful? If it's not, is the purpose of
| the article to solicit the sort of response you've provided?
|
| > You are going to die asking stupid questions in meetings.
|
| "Of all the offspring of Time, Error is the most ancient, and
| is so old and familiar an acquaintance, that Truth, when
| discovered, comes upon most of us like an intruder, and meets
| the intruder's welcome."
|
| -- Charles Mackay
|
| https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/227837-of-all-the-
| offspring...
| matrix_overload wrote:
| On the contrary, to be critical of what the media tells them,
| quantify problems, rank solutions and check for conflicts of
| interest.
|
| This won't work though. The critical thinking in the U.S.
| culture has been replaced by obedience, and we are back to
| hunting heretics in the name of holy symbols. It's a stable
| societal structure - look a poor Muslim countries, for
| example. They are busy blaming infidels for all their
| misfortunes, and will never attribute their poverty to the
| power structures on top of them. Threads like this, though,
| are good for gauging the speed of the societal decline and
| deciding when to emigrate forward.
|
| If you yourself haven't lived in a country where "greater
| good" was used to swiftly destroy the then-emerging middle
| class, you won't recognize the patterns, so you can ignore
| the whole thing.
| voisin wrote:
| It is worth considering the cost benefit of this
| criticality. What is gained by not trying to lessen human
| impact on our environment?
| alehlopeh wrote:
| A majority of the comments people leave on this site only
| make sense in the context of a room full of people in
| actionable positions. And of course no such room exists.
|
| People love to act as though they were woken up at 4am by
| their chief of staff, and they've just been led to the war
| room where their invaluable expertise is needed, stat, for
| the good of humanity.
|
| "Simple. We just need to change the behavior of every single
| person on the planet." they say with a tinge of annoyance.
| "Are we done here?"
| neltnerb wrote:
| > So, the correct question to ask is "what can we do as a
| reasonable trade-off to reduce the number of fires in the
| future without compromising the quality of life?". And the
| correct answer is "educate people on how to spot hazardous
| terrain and contain the fires they accidentally started".
| Requiring fire extinguishers at campsites/ATVs could help.
| Doing some training would help. Doing controlled burns would
| help. Renaming Environment Canada to "Environment and Climate
| Change Canada| and closing down local production in favor of
| Chinese imports won't.
|
| This is such a wild false dichotomy.
|
| Unless you're saying climate change has nothing to do with it,
| or is making fires better, it's a strange thing to play devil's
| advocate about -- especially pre-emptively.
|
| I accept the scientific consensus that climate change is making
| a lot of these natural disasters worse/different and more
| frequent, so addressing climate change _and_ teaching people
| how to survive novel natural disasters are both important on
| different time scales.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| What about telling children they are doomed? Wont that help?
| [deleted]
| Fricken wrote:
| I don't understand why telling children they are doomed is
| regarded as worse than actually dooming them.
| throwawaysleep wrote:
| One is far in the future and they won't be around to hear
| them anymore.
| goatlover wrote:
| It's worse when you're not actually dooming them, but you
| are discouraging them.
| freeslave wrote:
| "There are complex reasons for our dire wildfires, but
| scientists say climate change plays key role" [0]
|
| "Our forest management practices, they've been like this since
| about the '80s. So why is it we're seeing the bad fire seasons
| now? It's because the weather has gotten more extreme."
|
| [0] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/wildfire-
| fac...
| steve_adams_86 wrote:
| Here is a gif of all of the years in sequence. If you look at
| https://firesmoke.ca, or https://smokebuddy.app, you can see
| the fire perimeter polygons for 2023 so far. I'm not sure about
| perimeters for 2022, but I think there was less burned than
| this year and 2021.
|
| https://static.steve-adams.me/canada-fire-polys-1980-2021.gi...
| nvy wrote:
| >closing down local production in favor of Chinese imports
|
| This is Canada you're talking about. We have no idea how to do
| anything but destroy our own economy by offshoring.
| graeme wrote:
| Hmm. Do you have any more info about 2020? This is an
| interesting theory. I note a few things though
|
| 1. The number of fires is trending down, but
|
| 2. The area burned is trending up
|
| 3. The number of fires in 2020 wasn't noticeably different.
| Down but on trend. But area burned was very low
|
| Idly I wonder if some of the worst fires are started by humans
| through carelessness or on purpose, and this number of fires
| was down in 2020? Could also be a coincidence. Some years in
| the past had a very low area burned with a normal number of
| fires.
| matrix_overload wrote:
| >Hmm. Do you have any more info about 2020?
|
| Provincial parks were outright closed for some time. And
| people in general were too spooked to go grilling on a forest
| campsite with the entire extended family.
| dwroberts wrote:
| > The number of fires over the past 4 decades is trending down.
| The numbers for area burned looks like each time there's a
| peak, it burns out enough fuel to make subsequent years easier.
| There were a couple of peaks in 1980s/1990s, but nothing that
| big recently.
|
| I think this is a misleading interpretation of two (pretty
| vague) statistics.
|
| How have the mitigation strategies for fire changed over the
| last 30 years? The area burnt may not increase but the fires
| may be more fierce/more difficult to control, and the lack of
| change in these stats may be because of control techniques
| being different. The same can apply for the amount of
| preparatory work being done (/money spent) _before_ fire
| season.
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| Anyone got an update on how facebook is doing in BC?
| soupbowl wrote:
| Local news sites are blocked on Facebook but it didn't really
| matter, people used Facebook groups to pass better Info around.
| matteoraso wrote:
| _Scientists start to discover that the Earth is warming_ "Maybe
| they're wrong."
|
| _Scientists develop sophisticated models that show the dangers
| of global warming_ "We'll deal with it before it becomes a
| problem."
|
| _The catastrophic consequences are now being felt on a regular
| basis_ "Okay, it's definitely time for gradual, market-based
| solutions to global warming."
| [deleted]
| JimtheCoder wrote:
| To be fair, blaming these wildfires on global warming when
| proper forest management techniques aren't being used and
| resources are being cut sort of contributes to this
| phenomenon...doesn't it?
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Orchards and the like need to be managed. Forests shouldn't
| really. It's a mistake to think the entire planet needs to be
| treated like a private garden/agricultural resource. While
| forest management can help by reducing the amount of bush
| etc., it can't mitigate the large scale effect of vegetation
| simply _drying out_. This 'forest management' concept
| doesn't include watering the trees, after all.
|
| I'm a little sour on this term because it acts (consciously
| or unconsciously) to deflect from the actual problem of
| large-scale desiccation. Every time I hear it makes me think
| of someone saying 'Mars never has forest fires, because the
| vegetation has been cleared properly.'
| pfannkuchen wrote:
| > Forests shouldn't really
|
| Forests naturally burn. In California (at least) trees have
| features specifically evolved to fit into an environment
| with periodic natural fires. There are written reports of
| fires in North America going back many hundreds of years,
| and I believe the natives experienced fires before that as
| well, as evidenced by cultural practices and oral history.
|
| So you can either not manage the forests and avoid building
| into areas that would be affected by natural fires, or you
| can build into those areas but you do need to manage the
| forests.
|
| Where do you get the idea that forests don't need to be
| managed if we are to live in and around them? It seems like
| magical thinking to me.
|
| Note that this is orthogonal to the effect a warming earth
| has on severity. Qualitatively, you needed to manage
| forests in North America 1,000 years ago, and you still
| need to manage them today.
| teunispeters wrote:
| A large portion of BC is completely inaccessible by any means
| - which doesn't help. Lots of huge mountain ranges! But the
| problem turns out to be climate change, oil usage and the BC
| Conservatives deciding that the pine beetle could be stopped
| by normal winters (after "normal" winters were already fading
| ... but this is hindsight ...). Ok they were called the "BC
| liberal party" but they were a hard-right conservative party
| and still are ... but I'm not sure if the large-scale pine
| beetle caused dead forests are still a factor... my last trip
| through one of the areas currently on fire (a couple of weeks
| ago) - I didn't see the characteristic red/dead pine trees
| that time and while I'm just an inhabitant, I was looking.
| (Banff through Kelowna area to Vancouver, as my usual
| Kamloops route was already being evacuated in parts then).
| mistrial9 wrote:
| "things people got away with before" are now no longer
| optional.. as if the extra-safety cushions have been used up
| and are gone.. seems very predictable, and not either-or at
| all..
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| There is aloooot of forest in Canada. You can properly manage
| some of it near populated places, but it is simply infeasible
| to directly or indirectly manage even most of it.
| tadfisher wrote:
| The Cascades didn't always consist of endless acres of
| Douglas Fir and sword ferns. As the glaciers receded, the
| indigenous tribes and the natural fire ecology maintained
| oak savanna where there is now dense forest and fuel
| buildup. I agree with your point, but just wanted to point
| out that the land was manageable before we allowed most of
| it to turn into forest.
| beej71 wrote:
| This is fair, where there are historically poorly managed
| forests. But a lot of socal that burns isn't forest at all,
| for example. Same in Eastern Oregon. Or Santa Rosa.
| pensatoio wrote:
| less "global warming" more "poor forest management"
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| Huh? It's more like:
|
| _The catastrophic consequences are now being felt on a regular
| basis_ "Okay, it's definitely happening, but it's too late to
| do anything about it, so let's just live it up until
| extinction."
| jl6 wrote:
| This is why climate doomers are harmful. _Of course_ apathy
| is the response to being told there's no hope.
| smolder wrote:
| Apathy was the starting condition, not a result of people
| fretting about climate change.
| notatoad wrote:
| >The catastrophic consequences are now being felt on a
| regular basis "Okay, it's definitely happening"
|
| seems like there's still plenty of denial to go around
| channel_t wrote:
| From my own anecdotal observations, it sure seems like that
| the worse it gets the more mainstream denialism becomes.
| I'm also seeing a rise of cartoonishly absurd conspiracy
| theories that look loosely something like: "the commie
| democrats are using secret weather machines to push their
| radical agenda!" Not sure how we're supposed to fix any of
| this in our lifetimes when reality itself is so easily
| trampled by culture war nonsense.
| matteoraso wrote:
| I hate that you're right.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| Does anyone not see that everything gets blamed on climate
| change wholesale?
| VancouverMan wrote:
| There's more to it than just that.
|
| For example, the Canadian politicians who focus the most on
| that subject, and who impose onerous "carbon taxes" on
| everyone, spend a lot of time in planes flying all over the
| country, and even overseas. Most of this travel is
| unnecessary and pointless.
|
| When those politicians are on the ground, we can see them
| riding in rather sizable motorcades involving armoured SUVs
| and other larger vehicles.
|
| More absurdly, though, is that these same politicians have
| simultaneously pushed immigration into Canada to extreme
| levels, flying huge numbers of people in from literally the
| opposite side of the globe.
|
| Having more people in the country obviously means more need
| for housing (which in turn requires land), electricity,
| heating/cooling, roads, vehicles, food, and other resources.
| Producing and operating those, in turn, require more of the
| emissions that are deemed unacceptable.
|
| It's all very hypocritical and contradictory.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I don't see that as a problem. The problem is brainwashing
| (mostly well meaning progressives) into doom culture, it's
| an easy way to justify extremely totalitarianism.
|
| We already went through that in the 70's with nuclear
| power. Humanity would be far better off if it weren't for
| 70's progressives and their anti-nuclear agenda. It's the
| same but worse this time: welcome our new climate tyrants.
|
| Climate change is a cult with religious qualities. I
| haven't seen anyone rebutting that.
|
| I don't give a shit if people use private jets for whatever
| reason.
| hhw wrote:
| Maybe it has to do with the US having double the per
| capita carbon footprint, and double the cumulative total
| amount of CO2 of China, and many multiples of India:
|
| https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions
| -pe...
|
| https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-which-countries-are-
| his....
| goatlover wrote:
| The climate doesn't care about per capita, also nuclear
| power could have been used to reduce carbon footprint.
| hhw wrote:
| There's far more room for improvement when per capita is
| high than there is when per capita is low.
|
| And the climate certainly does care about cumulative CO2.
|
| Would have, could have, should have. But didn't. Trying
| to hold others accountable without getting one's own
| house in order just comes off as the blatant hypocrisy it
| actually is. Until we do better ourselves, we are in no
| position to call others out.
| macintux wrote:
| > For example, the Canadian politicians who focus the most
| on that subject, and who impose onerous "carbon taxes" on
| everyone, spend a lot of time in planes flying all over the
| country, and even overseas. Most of this travel is
| unnecessary and pointless.
|
| Do you have data indicating that the politicians who
| _don't_ focus on the subject are more modest with their
| travel?
| JimtheCoder wrote:
| "Do you have data indicating that the politicians who
| don't focus on the subject are more modest with their
| travel?"
|
| Why would they be if they don't care as much...?
| ceejayoz wrote:
| But it's being asserted that both sides don't genuinely
| care; that they care equally as much.
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-
| investigations/cre...
|
| > Last fiscal year, the Trump family took more trips that
| required Secret Service protection than the Obama family
| took in seven, according to a budget document released by
| the Treasury Department. On average, Obama's family took
| 133.3 protected trips per year, while the Trump family
| has taken an average of 1,625 annually.
|
| There's one (non-Canadian) datapoint.
|
| Before anyone shouts "but Trump's family is bigger!":
| read the link.
| iFire wrote:
| Good scientific observation.
|
| To make a comparison that Canadian politicians who impose
| taxes jet travel more are harming the environment more,
| we need a comparison between controlled variable and the
| tested variable like the amount of jet travel Canadian
| politicians who don't impose taxes do.
| ta8645 wrote:
| The point is, if they honestly believed in climate
| change, their actions would reflect a state of emergency.
| Instead, they act as if nothing is wrong, except when it
| comes time to impose limits on others, and then they
| remember it's all justified by the need to save the
| planet. So comparing to other politicians is pointless,
| it's their actions in relation to their policies that is
| at issue, not how it compares to other politicians.
| jl6 wrote:
| Remember that being a hypocrite doesn't make someone's
| arguments incorrect.
| LudwigNagasena wrote:
| > _Scientists develop sophisticated models that show the
| dangers of global warming_
|
| _Scientists treat their jobs as sinecure, benefit from
| unpublished data and closed-source code while receiving public
| funding_
|
| Nothing to see here, people, get that Believe Science t-shirt
| and move on.
|
| > _The catastrophic consequences are now being felt on a
| regular basis_ "Okay, it's definitely time for gradual, market-
| based solutions to global warming."
|
| I guess you disagree with economists who won the most
| prestigious award in their field and who also build
| sophisticated models? Pick your own dismal science to root for!
| Being a science believer have never been so exciting, now you
| can treat it like football or politics!
| [deleted]
| mcpackieh wrote:
| https://fire.airnow.gov/
|
| So far, air quality in the PNW isn't too bad, this is barely
| notable compared to past years. Hopefully it stays this way.
| UncleOxidant wrote:
| Yeah, so far it's been good this year in the Portland area...
| but there's still another month+ of fire season to go. IIRC the
| 2020 fires flared up in September and we had terrible air
| quality for at least a week.
| channel_t wrote:
| Yup, and 2020 was downright apocalyptic, with AQI readings so
| hazardous they basically went off the charts. Also worth
| noting that last year the bad air quality in Portland didn't
| really start until October and stopped during the final days
| of it, so we can reasonably expect a solid 2 months left of
| smoke season still.
| beej71 wrote:
| It's not the worst ever in central Oregon, but it's between bad
| and really bad. Today's an improvement from yesterday, when I
| drove 45 minutes north to walk the dog someplace with an AQI
| under 200.
| DeRock wrote:
| About half of Washington has an AQI over 300. The coast is
| mostly clear, but it will depend on how the wind trends. These
| latest south central BC fires only really grew in the last 48
| hours too.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| Seattle has an AQI of 109 ATM, much if Washington lives in
| that region. Spokane in contrast is at 289 ATM. If forests
| are burning primarily in Eastern BC, the mountains couod save
| us.
| brightsize wrote:
| I'm in Spokane, and on the PurpleAir website there are
| readings >500 all around, even in the city, which is not
| (yet) burning. The air outside is subjectively awful, the
| worst I can recall in 20 years living here. I'll be holing-
| up today with fans/filters running, not that it will do
| much good.
|
| What's burning, at least nearby, is not forests AFAIK, it's
| grasslands.
| loeg wrote:
| I don't know what source you're looking at but I'm seeing
| AQI in the 30s for Seattle right now, and ~300 east of the
| cascades. The wind is blowing out of the east and Seattle's
| air will get a lot worse this evening, but it isn't 110
| yet.
| soultrees wrote:
| Sun is looking pretty orange today in Vancouver.
| singingboyo wrote:
| You can see the sun? All I see is grey smoke slowly
| settling down on us.
|
| It's going to suck for a couple days, I think.
| pchristensen wrote:
| https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2023/08/smoke-and-tropical-st...
|
| Heads up.
| brightsize wrote:
| Sock it to us, BC.
|
| "OKANOGAN COUNTY, Wash. -- The Crater Creek fire, that has burned
| an estimated 54,000 acres in British Columbia, has entered into
| Okanogan County." https://inx.lv/mi5t
| [deleted]
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