West Coast Smoke, UGH!

[dragoneggs]

One of the fires in Oregon is about 5 miles from me. The air quality is currently measuring over 500. Even healthy young people are hacking and coughing. Our governor says she is directing OHSA to enforce work place air quality safety. I'm really curious to see how this works out.

Who knew these annoying masks would come in handy for more than Covid! :fiery:

 

[ruffdog]

Hazy skies over Wisconsin this morning due to wildfire smoke from the western U.S.

Yeah, and at 6pm the sun is just a dull orange ball. What the heck....I can't imagine how bad it must be......

 

[ovrszd]

Who knew these annoying masks would come in handy for more than Covid! :fiery:

You are "on the Mark" there.

 

[MossRoad]

Sunrise here in South Bend was weird. About 7:45 the sun looked like a dull full moon rising. All day the fluffy clouds that would normally be white were gray. There's a haze above the clouds. Very weird.

 

[dragoneggs]

Sunrise here in South Bend was weird. About 7:45 the sun looked like a dull full moon rising. All day the fluffy clouds that would normally be white were gray. There's a haze above the clouds. Very weird.

I find it interesting that my snapshots from my iPhone without any color correction (white balance), show the smoke much more warmer brown than my naked eye which seeing it more neutral grey.

 

[California]

A couple of links. (both load slowly).

This one shows all the air quality sensors in your region.
https://www.purpleair.com/map?opt=1/m/i/mAQI/a10/cC0#4.74/44.14/-116.63
I centered it on PNW. You can slide it around then zoom down to where you are. I see a 748 near the California/Oregon border and an 808 down by Yosemite!
Run your cursor over the 'rainbow' lower left for interpretation. Over 300 is emergency conditions.

This satellite view shows what's going on with the fires, wind direction, smoke plumes. Note you have to set date/time manually, and it shows visible smoke only in daylight hours. if you roll the hours forward hour by daylight hour you can see the smoke move.
Zoom Earth | LIVE satellite images, weather & wildfire maps


Added: Zoomable smoke intensity map. Using the 'layers' symbol at upper right, you can turn on/off the 'low cost' (purpleair amateur?) sensors to distinguish the few official sensors.
Fire and Smoke Map

 

[dragoneggs]

A couple of links. (both load slowly).

This one shows all the air quality sensors in your region.
https://www.purpleair.com/map?opt=1/m/i/mAQI/a10/cC0#4.74/44.14/-116.63
I centered it on PNW. You can slide it around then zoom down to where you are. I see a 748 near the California/Oregon border and an 808 down by Yosemite!
Run your cursor over the 'rainbow' lower left for interpretation. Over 300 is emergency conditions.

This satellite view shows what's going on with the fires, wind direction, smoke plumes. Note you have to set date/time manually, and it shows visible smoke only in daylight hours. if you roll the hours forward hour by daylight hour you can see the smoke move.
Zoom Earth | LIVE satellite images, weather & wildfire maps

Thanks for sharing... seems the sensors only show for somewhat populous areas.

My son is living in Bend and they are over 500. I'm worried about them and my new little baby granddaughter. He has a window A/C and trying to mod it with the best filtration he can to keep the smoke from coming inside.

 

[Skeans1]

Thanks for sharing... seems the sensors only show for somewhat populous areas.

My son is living in Bend and they are over 500. I'm worried about them and my new little baby granddaughter. He has a window A/C and trying to mod it with the best filtration he can to keep the smoke from coming inside.

They make air purifiers that you can set on the floor that might help.

 

[California]

... has a window A/C and trying to mod it with the best filtration he can to keep the smoke from coming inside.

Window air conditioners I'm familiar with, recirculate indoor air and don't bring in any from outside. The reason it's in a window is, there is a second radiator on the exterior side that sheds the heat that the interior radiator collected.

Note I added a third link in my post above. It has diagrams showing where the smoke is most severe.

 

[California]

This one shows all the air quality sensors in your region.
PurpleAir | Real Time Air Quality Monitoring

... seems the sensors only show for somewhat populous areas.

I glanced briefly at purpleair's website and it seems they sell sensors, starting at homeowner grade for a couple hundred $, that all feed into their online real time maps. Little local fire departments everywhere could probably afford that.

I expect they are all too busy at the moment to care, but maybe a call for community donations for purchase and setup could help expand real time reporting from the remote areas.