Wildfire Smoke From Canada Expected To Keep On Coming Into Washington And Oregon
Wildfire Smoke From Canada Expected To Keep On Coming Into Washington And Oregon
02 August 2017
published by http://kuow.org
USA – Winds from the north and northeast have carried wildfire smoke from British Columbia over Washington and Oregon.
We didnt expect it to go that far so quickly, says Ranil Dhammapala, with the Washington State Department of Ecology. Its pretty much blanketed the whole state.
And forecasts predict smoke will keep coming and continue to blanket Washington and Oregon throughout the weekend. In eastern Washington, the winds will shift and bring smoke from Montana. And, in western Washington and Oregon, the winds will bring back smoke thats drifted over the Pacific.
Those with heart or lung disease, asthma, diabetes, and for people in similar categories, they should mostly try to limit the amount of time they spend outdoors, Dhammapala advises.
Agencies have issued burn bans and air pollution advisories for much of Washington and Oregon.
The most recent air quality readings are available on the Washington State Department of Ecology website and the Oregon smoke blog maintained by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.
As for getting away for the smoke, Dhammapala says the only way to do that would be to climb above five thousand feet of elevation and then you would have to be careful about the hot, dry, windy conditions conducive to wildfires.
An international team of climate researchers from the US, South Korea and the UK has developed a new wildfire and drought prediction model for southwestern North America. Extending far beyond the current seasonal forecast, this study published in the journal Scientific Reports could benefit the economies with a variety of applications in agriculture, water management and forestry.
Over the past 15 years, California and neighboring regions have experienced heighteneddrought conditions and an increase inwildfire numbers with considerable impacts on human livelihoods, agriculture, and terrestrial ecosystems. This new research shows that in addition to a discernible contribution from natural forcings and human-induced global warming, the large-scale difference between Atlantic and Pacific ocean temperatures plays a fundamental role in causing droughts, and enhancing wildfire risks.
“Our results document that a combination of processes is at work. Through an ensemble modeling approach, we were able to show that without anthropogenic effects, the droughts in the southwestern United States would have been less severe,” says co-author Axel Timmermann, Director of the newly founded IBS Center for Climate Physics, within the Institute for Basics Science (IBS), and Distinguished Professor at Pusan National University in South Korea. “By prescribing the effects of man-made climate change and observed global ocean temperatures, our model can reproduce the observed shifts in weather patterns and wildfire occurrences.”
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-07-atlanticpacific-ocean-temperature-difference-fuels.html#jCpAn international team of climate researchers from the US, South Korea and the UK has developed a new wildfire and drought prediction model for southwestern North America. Extending far beyond the current seasonal forecast, this study published in the journal Scientific Reports could benefit the economies with a variety of applications in agriculture, water management and forestry.
Over the past 15 years, California and neighboring regions have experienced heighteneddrought conditions and an increase inwildfire numbers with considerable impacts on human livelihoods, agriculture, and terrestrial ecosystems. This new research shows that in addition to a discernible contribution from natural forcings and human-induced global warming, the large-scale difference between Atlantic and Pacific ocean temperatures plays a fundamental role in causing droughts, and enhancing wildfire risks.
“Our results document that a combination of processes is at work. Through an ensemble modeling approach, we were able to show that without anthropogenic effects, the droughts in the southwestern United States would have been less severe,” says co-author Axel Timmermann, Director of the newly founded IBS Center for Climate Physics, within the Institute for Basics Science (IBS), and Distinguished Professor at Pusan National University in South Korea. “By prescribing the effects of man-made climate change and observed global ocean temperatures, our model can reproduce the observed shifts in weather patterns and wildfire occurrences.”
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-07-atlanticpacific-ocean-temperature-difference-fuels.html#jCp
