Oregon smoke plume sends Tri-Cities hazardous air quality off state charts

The smoke blanketing the Tri-Cities was so thick Saturday it’s off the charts for the state’s rating scale for hazardous air quality, with little relief expected until at least Monday.

The National Weather Service has issued a dense smoke advisory for the Tri-Cities area through noon Monday and and Benton County Clean Air Agency issued an air quality alert through at least Monday.

Gradual clearing of smoke was expected to start on the Washington coast on Sunday from west to east.

But it will be Monday before that pushes across the state, according to Ranil Dhammapala, of the Department of Ecology, posting on the Washington state smoke blog.

That means western Washington, where much of the air was rated as hazardous Saturday, could be close to peak air pollution for recent days on Saturday morning, he said.

But the smoke in Eastern Washington was expected to remain thick on Sunday.

“The size of the Oregon smoke plumes parked offshore is so “super-massive,” and the fires themselves are very smoky, so smoke will continue to pour into the state for a while to come,” Dhammapala said. “And there are also several fires within Washington to contend with.”

The smoke plume off the Pacific Coast had spread across all of Washington and Oregon by Saturday morning.

The cold front forecast to move into the Tri-Cities on Monday should provide some relief and it could bring rain to help clear the air on Tuesday, according to the weather service forecast.

The state rates air quality on a scale of 1 to 500, with so much smoke polluting the air in the Tri-Cities that in topped 500 in the Tri-Cities late Friday afternoon and stayed there on Saturday.

That was compounded at times Friday with elevated ozone levels in the Tri-Cities.

Until smoke starting pouring into the Tri-Cities on Labor Day, the air had not been so polluted in the Tri-Cities that it went off Ecology charts since September 2013, when a haboob, a wall of dust carried by a weather front, swept into the Tri-Cities.

Health concerns

The Washington state Department of Health said it was concerned that breathing the smoke will worsen symptoms of COVID-19 patients. Both COVID-19 and breathing in smoke impact respiratory and immune systems.

Smoke also can make people more susceptible to respiratory infections, like COVID-19, said the Department of Health.

Some people most vulnerable to wildfire smoke, like those over 65 or with pre-existing conditions, are also those most at risk for serious impacts from COVID-19.

Dr. Amy Person, health officer for the Benton Franklin Health District, is concerned that people who may be newly infected with the coronavirus attribute symptoms such as coughing, wheezing and shortness of breath to the smoky air and put off getting tested.

Timely testing helps identify who is infected and those they may have infected to limit the spread of the disease.

Tri-Cities area residents can check current air quality at bentoncleanair.org, which posts a graphic showing the level of smoke and dust in the air at a monitor in Kennewick.

The state departments of health and ecology give this tips to protect your health:

▪ Stay indoors, advice that’s particularly important for children, older adults, pregnant women and those with health conditions such as diabetes, a history of stroke, lung disease or heart disease. Limit strenuous activity indoors.

▪ Close your windows and doors to reduce intake of smoke. However, ventilation is good for helping prevent COVID-19, so when air quality is good, open them to get fresh air and reduce potential viral load.

▪ Improve filtration of indoor air in your home and create a clean air room where you spend most of your time. Making your own box fan filter can be a less expensive option to filter air and improve indoor air quality in a single room. Filtering indoor air is an effective way to reduce fine particles from wildfire smoke.

▪ Avoid burning candles or incense, smoking inside, frying or broiling, or vacuuming unless your vacuum has a HEPA filter.

▪ Wear your cloth face covering to slow the spread of COVID-19. While cloth face coverings may help a small amount with smoke, they won’t filter out the fine particles or hazardous gasses. N95 respirators, if fitted and worn properly, can reduce exposure to wildfire smoke, but as the supply remains limited, these need to be reserved for workers that are required to wear them for their job.

This story was originally published September 12, 2020 at 11:31 AM.