Canadian wildfires trigger second day of air quality alerts in Knoxville
The skies across Knoxville and East Tennessee are hazy for a second day as Canadian wildfire smoke continues to billow into Southern states. The air quality has deteriorated and is considered worse than yesterday.
Knoxville, the Great Smoky Mountains and other areas of East Tennessee are under an air quality alert, the National Weather Service says. The air is unhealthy on the Air Quality Index.
The alert means those with heart or lung disease, older adults, children and teens should:
Avoid strenuous outdoor activities.
Keep outdoor activities short.
Consider moving physical activities indoors or rescheduling them.
Wildfires in Canada continue to blanket certain American states in smog, triggering new air quality alerts, according to the National Weather Service. While the agency predicted the haze should wane soon, sensitive groups could still be at risk in the upcoming week.
Smoke from Canadian wildfires has been problem across Middle America for weeks. As of July 15, nearly 900 fires have burned in a record-breaking year in Canada, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre.
Canada’s eastern provinces such as Quebec, Ontario and Nova Scotia have been hit particularly hard this year by large and at times uncontrollable infernos. But British Columbia, along Canada’s west coast, had the second-highest number of active fires, followed by Alberta and Ontario.
The air quality index, or AQI, measures the air quality and level of health concern it presents as measured by the Environmental Protection Agency.
What is the forecast? US air quality map
USA TODAY and the Tennessean contributed to this report.
This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Canadian wildfires trigger second day of Knoxville air quality alerts
