UPDATED 5:25 P.M.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The shroud of polluted air emanating from Canadian wildfires pushed further down the Atlantic Seaboard on Thursday, blanketing Washington, D.C., in an unhealthy haze and prompting many residents of the nation’s capital to stay indoors.
Traffic was light and trains less crowded than usual as many companies in the city told employees to work from home. Some non-essential municipal services were suspended, including parks and recreation, road construction and waste collection.
The Washington Nationals baseball team called off its home game, while the National Zoo shut down for the day. The Biden administration postponed its Pride Month event, which had been expected to be the largest celebration for LGBTQ+ people in the White House’s history.
It was the worst case of wildfire smoke blanketing the U.S. Northeast in more than 20 years, according to private forecasting service AccuWeather.
The U.S. National Weather Service extended air quality alerts from New England to South Carolina, as well as parts of the Midwest, including Ohio, Indiana and Michigan. The smoke reached as far as Norway by Thursday, according to scientists tracking the level of particulates in Scandinavia.
Millions of Americans have been advised to stay indoors if possible to avoid respiratory issues and other health problems that could arise due to the high levels of fine particulates in the atmosphere.
Government data showed air quality readings above the “hazardous” level in Washington on Thursday morning.
Marvin Binnick, who moved to Washington from Nebraska a month ago, said watching the wildfire smoke roll into the nation’s capital from his 12th floor apartment was surreal.
“This is supposed to be a typical sunny day, but I can’t see the sky or sun or anything,” said Binnick, who was sent home from his customer service job early on Thursday. “Normally D.C. is pretty popping – but on my way to work and on my way home today, it looked like a ghost town.”
Many people wore masks outside as a thick layer of smoke veiled the capital. The dense smog, which reeked of ash, erased the top of the Washington Monument from view.
“This problem is likely to continue or worsen through Friday,” Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser said in a tweet. “We urge residents and visitors to follow precautions.”
BRIGHTER SKIES OVER NEW YORK
In New York, which spent much of Wednesday covered in a sickly haze, air remained some of the worst in the world on Thursday, with pollution similar to that found in perennially smoggy cities such as Dhaka and Delhi, according to IQAir, a Swiss technology company.
Though a smell of burning wood lingered, the skies were brighter on Thursday morning than on Wednesday, but as evening approached, the haze appeared to be thickening again.
After two days in which schools called off outdoor activities, including sports practices and recess, New York’s public school system announced that its more than 1 million students would shift to remote learning on Friday.
The smoke prompted aviation officials to halt incoming flights to major airports in New York and Philadelphia from the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic region and Ohio for a second day. All flights bound for the airport in Newark, New Jersey, a major New York-area airport, were delayed.
Smoky conditions are likely to persist until Sunday, when a new storm system shifts the direction of prevailing winds, National Weather Service meteorologist Peter Mullinax said.
But researchers have said wildfires will occur more often and at higher intensity due to climate change.
“Public knowledge is a huge issue,” said Keith Bein of the Air Quality Research Center at the University of California, Davis. “People need to realize that this is not a one-off event. These fires are going to be the new normal.”
While the conditions have disrupted daily life for millions of Americans, the impact on the U.S. economy is likely to be limited and short-lived, according to Ryan Sweet, chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics.
In Canada, where the smoke originated, the federal government gave Toronto a “high risk” rating based on the air quality on Thursday afternoon, while other cities such as Ottawa and Montreal were at “low risk” as smoky conditions eased.
The country is enduring its worst-ever start to wildfire season, with thousands forced from their homes.
The U.S. has dispatched more than 600 firefighters to Canada to help the country battle the blazes. President Joe Biden, who has called the wildfires another reminder of the dangers of climate change, said U.S. officials were monitoring air quality and aviation delays.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington and Brad Brooks in Lubbock, TexasAdditional reporting by Tyler Clifford, Gabriella Borter, Julia Harte, Trevor Hunnicutt, Brad Brooks, Susan Heavey, Nancy Lapid and Dan BurnsWriting by Joseph AxEditing by Jonathan Oatis, Frances Kerry and Alistair Bell)
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NEW YORK (Reuters) -A smoky yellow haze generated by hundreds of Canadian wildfires hovered over a large swath of the United States on Thursday, threatening to make breathing difficult and disrupt air travel for millions of people until the weekend and beyond.
The U.S. National Weather Service extended air quality alerts for another day for the East Coast from New England to South Carolina, as well as parts of the Midwest, including Ohio, Indiana and Michigan.
Health officials in more than a dozen states have warned that spending time outdoors could cause respiratory issues due to the high levels of fine particulates in the atmosphere.
Advised to stay indoors, residents of New York, Washington and other big cities donned masks and rushed to buy air purifiers to protect themselves from the yellow haze that arrived in the region on Tuesday afternoon.
The haze and low visibility prompted aviation officials to halt incoming flights to major airports in New York and Philadelphia from the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic region and Ohio for a second day. All flights bound for the airport in Newark, New Jersey, a major New York-area airport, were delayed.
It was the worst outbreak of wildfire smoke to blanket the U.S. Northeast in more than 20 years, according to private forecasting service AccuWeather.
Smoky conditions are likely to persist until Sunday when a new storm system shifts the direction of prevailing winds and brings a chance of rainfall in parts of the country nearing drought conditions, National Weather Service meteorologist Peter Mullinax said.
“We’re finally going to start to see more relief by the time we hit the early part of next week when we start to see those southerly winds come in and push that smoke more farther north and out into the Atlantic,” Mullinax said.
With an “unhealthy” Air Quality Index reading of 178, New York City’s air on Thursday was again more polluted than any major city in the world, topping cities such as Dhaka and Hanoi that are fixtures on the global bad-air list compiled by IQAir, a Swiss technology company.
The U.S. Air Quality Index (AQI) measures five major pollutants, including particulate matter produced by fires. The higher the reading, the more polluted the air. Readings over 100 are classified as “unhealthy” while those exceeding 300 are “hazardous.”
Within the United States, the worst air was found in locations in Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware, where some readings exceeded 300. Some suburbs of Baltimore and Philadelphia topped 400.
Even so, conditions in New York seemed a bit clearer than a day earlier, as patches of blue opened up in the morning skies over midtown Manhattan. While the faint smell of burning wood lingered, the smothering blanket of yellow and orange-tinged haze appeared to thin out, bringing a modicum of relief.
However, the bad air again forced a slew of cancellations on Thursday. Horse racing was scratched at a track on New York’s Long Island that is set to host the prestigious Belmont Stakes this weekend.
In Washington, public schools called off outdoor activities, including sports, for a second day.
“This problem is likely to continue or worsen through Friday,” Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser said in a tweet. “We urge residents and visitors to follow precautions related to the ‘Code Purple’ air quality alert.”
Large swaths of Michigan are also under red flag warnings due to dangerous fire weather conditions in both of the state’s peninsulas, according to the weather agency.
Forest fires continued to burn across Canada on Thursday, sending more smoke across the U.S. border.
The country is enduring its worst-ever start to wildfire season. Thousands of Canadians have been forced from their homes and about 3.8 million hectares (9.4 million acres) have already burned, roughly 15 times the 10-year average, according to federal Minister of Emergency Preparedness Bill Blair.
(Reporting by Tyler Clifford; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
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