No short-term relief in sight for smoke drifting to NNY from Quebec

Jun. 6—WATERTOWN — In Clayton, people woke up Tuesday morning and couldn't see the St. Lawrence River. In Watertown, street lights came on later in the morning as the smoke that has drifted south from Quebec wildfires permeated the north country and prompted air quality alerts.

The situation won't be getting any better in the next few days.

"It's going to continue to be worse for you," Mark W. Wysocki, a climatologist at Cornell University, Ithaca, said on Tuesday. "It doesn't look like any kind of improvement down the road."

As of Monday, more than 150 wildfires were active in Quebec. The smoke from the fires is moving north to south, reflecting a general weather pattern that is also moving any storm systems in that direction.

Mr. Wysocki's research interests are in the areas of air pollution, forecasting and weather analysis.

"It does not look, with our weather patterns, it's not going to shift that much," he said of the smoke heading our way.

A smoke forecast produced by the University of British Columbia shows that the smoke forecasted to drift over Lake Ontario and into New York will be especially bad on Thursday, especially over Lake Ontario.

"The fires are burning out of control and this will be pretty much the rule for the week — this week at least," Mr. Wysocki said.

The smoke has caused an air quality alert from the Department of Environmental Conservation. It is "unhealthy for sensitive groups." The alert has caused the cancellation of several activities from Clayton to Massena.

The St. Lawrence County Public Health Department issued a health alert Tuesday afternoon: "Due to Canadian wildfires, St. Lawrence County's air quality has worsened over the last few days. The haze has reached an unhealthy level in our region as of 6/6, so it's recommended to monitor yourself closely for any difficulty breathing, coughing, or shortness of breath."

A STATE ALERT

Air quality across the state has become poor since the fires in Canada began, and on Tuesday state Department of Environmental Conservation and Department of Health officials warned the public of the risks the smoke can pose to health.

"Particulate matter has reached a certain level in our breathing air, which is of concern to all New Yorkers, but in particular to people in sensitive categories," DEC Commissioner Basil B. Seggos said during a virtual press conference.

Health officials are warning all New Yorkers to avoid strenuous outdoor activity, and limit heavy breathing while outdoors. They warned that the smoky air can cause itchy or stinging eyes, a scratchy throat, a tendency to sneeze, and those with breathing issues like asthma or lung impairments may find the air quality can significantly limit the amount of activity they're able to do, outside or inside.

Mr. Seggos said this is an unprecedented fire season in terms of how early in the year it is starting, and the scale of the fires in Canada.

"It is a very dry year, a very warm year, and there are concerns that these conditions will persist, in terms of air quality, over the next few days," he said.

Gary Ginsberg, director of the state health department's Center for Environmental Health, said the smoke carries particulates of a particularly small size, which can move across vast distances and be carried deep into lung tissues when inhaled.

"It makes the work of the heart more difficult and especially those predisposed because of emphysema, asthma, other cardiopulmonary disorders, heart disease," he said.

He said anyone having difficulty breathing should head inside and rest, and anyone struggling with basic movement like climbing stairs or moving around their home should contact their health care provider or an urgent care.

Mr. Seggos said that New Yorkers should anticipate that the smoky conditions and poor air quality will persist for as long as the Canadian wildfires burn at such a significant rate. He said New York has sent assistance and a crew boss to help the Canadian forest service fight the forest fires.

"It's a very good idea not to be outside exerting in any way, shape or form," Mr. Wysocki said. "This can cause a great deal of not only short-term, but long-term damage to people, pets and plants."

Mr. Wysocki said that running outside for exercise at any time of the day would be bad.

"When you run, you exert more and you breathe in more air," he said. "But more important, you force that air deeper into your respiratory system and down into your lungs, especially the small particles, the very fine particles. They get down in there and they can cause all kinds of issues with not only your respiratory system, but your heart."

As for outdoor plants, Mr. Wysocki said that potted plants can be brought inside or covered to prevent the leaf structure from absorbing harmful chemicals and to prevent soot from attaching to the leaves.

"The rest of the plants and crops will be exposed to the chemicals and particles, and not much help for them," he said.

AN 'ORANGE KIND OF FOG'

Jeffrey T. Garnsey is a third-generation fishing guide who describes himself as "healthy as a horse." He postponed his scheduled non-fishing river cruise for customers on Tuesday due to the smoky conditions on the river. "It's making my throat burn, so I just waved them off and told them I wasn't going to do any forced fun on the river today," he said.

Mr. Garnsey also oversees Garnsey's Feral Acres with his wife, Julie, in Depauville. The facility is a nonprofit, 158-acre sanctuary that houses pigs, goats, cats, dogs, cows and donkeys — 74 animals total. Mr. Garnsey said the smoke seemed to be settling inside the barn, so he placed the animals out and away from it.

"After breathing it for just a few minutes, it starts to really work on your throat a little bit," Mr. Garnsey said. "If it's burning my throat, I know it's burning the animals' throats."

He described the smoke around Clayton and Depauville as "a very orange kind of a fog."

"The Northeast is pulling all of that down," he said. "And with the temperature of the water, it's drawing it down close to just like it would a fog bank. You can smell that mild, burning smell."

Mr. Wysocki said it's advisable to wear masks outside. "It's not that you are spreading anything. It's the fact that you don't want to breathe it in. It's mainly to prevent breathing in these fine particles. Most masks will stop the bigger ones. The smaller ones will get through regardless."

And those smaller particles, Mr. Wysocki said, are easier to "get past your nose and esophagus."

"They get deeper into the lungs, and when they get deeper into the lungs, they're able to get into your blood stream. Your blood stream carries them throughout and that's why you end up with having cardiac issues," he said. "It's mainly stress put on your heart."

All of this smoke drifting south from Quebec is due to a coastal weather pattern.

"There's a big storm system off the coast of New Brunswick," said Dan P. Kelly, a forecaster with the Buffalo office of the National Weather Service. "The circulation around it is bringing stuff in from the north. That's going to persist and very slowly move out of the area."

The circulation of the system, Mr. Kelly said, is counter-clockwise and the winds bringing the smoke down from Quebec will last "through Friday, at least."

"We have some pretty strong winds that are able to move that smoke and the chemistry and everything else," Mr. Wysocki said. "The unfortunate thing is the winds help to fan the fires. They will help these fires be fairly intense."

Another issue fanning the flames, Mr. Wysocki said, is that many of the fires are in a wildlife preserve in central Quebec. The major fires are around Lebel-sur-Quevillon, he said. Thousands of residents had to be evacuated from that area.

"They have three major fires that are upwards of 38,000 to 40,000 acres and there's no way to get people in there to put them out," Mr. Wysocki said. "It's a very remote area."

He predicted, "They're going to be fanned by warm, dry winds. That means these fires are just going to burn uncontrolled as they have for weeks. There's no big weather pattern to try to help them put the flames out. What they don't need is thunderstorms. The thunderstorms will start fires with the lightning. The amount of rain coming out of the thunderstorms isn't enough to put out the fires."

MEET THE BEETLE

An invasive insect may also be making wildfires worse, Mr. Wysocki said. Western pine beetles, or bark beetles, destroy the lodgepole pines across the western United States. Because of warm temperatures in winters, the beetles have been able to migrate from northern Mexico to the U.S. and Canada.

"It wasn't cold enough to kill them," Mr. Wysocki said. "Because of that, it spread rapidly, and because it kills the trees, you have all these dry, dead trees around. When you do spark a fire, it's more intense and will spread more rapidly. We have kind of a combination of what happens between the warming of the Earth with climate change: how these insects behave and then how it feeds back on the ecology. And now we see the results with these large fires."

He added, "What happened out west is manifesting itself eastward. Now, it's manifested itself southward in terms of the health issues that we will see from all this smoke."

In the Ithaca area on Tuesday, Mr. Wysocki said there was "a hint of smoke."

"Most of the people in my department who usually go out at this time for their run are not doing so because they tried it yesterday and they ended up coughing a lot."

The smoke, he said, is being transported from the surface up to 18,000 feet in the atmosphere.

"It's a northerly wind and it's coming right from the fires," Mr. Wysocki said. "It's a deep layer of smoke and the chemicals being pushed our way."