It’s pretty safe to say the smoke is getting worse in the Prince George area following the recent rash of wildfires in Northern BC.
A Special Air Quality Advisory has been in effect for almost three weeks now.
Environment Canada Meteorologist, Dave Ray explains how the smoke is sticking around.
“This giant ridge of high pressure we’ve had over the region and essentially acts as a lid, what happens is with the wildfires being active and the smoke, it actually keeps the smoke in the valleys and doesn’t have a chance to disperse so that hurts the air quality along with that smell of smoke.”
A thick smog is blanketing Vanderhoof at the moment as we’ve reached the peak of the summer wildfire season in BC.
Several Evacuation Orders and Alerts have been issued in the past week within the Local, Northwest and Cariboo Fire Centres forcing some people to leave their homes.
However, there is some light at the end of the tunnel according to Ray.
“Saturday and Sunday and the latter part of tomorrow are looking quite good, the thing is with the number of active wildfires in the province right now and the return to nicer conditions next week there is the possibility we could see the air quality return.”
“The issue with this cold front that we are expecting to come through your area later tomorrow is there is a possibility of some thunderstorm development, which of course produces lightning and isn’t the greatest thing when conditions are so dry.”
Ray expects conditions to improve after today as there is a 60% chance of showers on Friday with a high of 27 degrees.