Tri-Cities air deteriorates to ‘very unhealthy.’ When will wildfire smoke clear?
Smoke inundated the Tri-Cities over the weekend, with air quality rated “very unhealthy” Saturday evening and ratings deteriorating again to ‘very unhealthy’ on Sunday.
As fires burned to the north of the Tri-Cities, Interstate 90 had closures for much of the weekend.
The Lincoln County, Wash., Sheriff’s Office reported Sunday morning that as emergency crews fought the Gray Fire near Interstate 90 south of Medical Lake the interstate was closed eastbound at Sprague and westbound at Highway 2 at Spokane.
Detours were being set up to divert traffic heading toward Spokane north on Highway 231 at Sprague and southwestbound traffic to Highway 2 and then south on Highways 28 and 23 to Sprague.
A large fire also was burning through the weekend in southern British Columbia about 60 miles north of the border, with another one on the Canada and U.S. border crossing into central Washington.
Other fires in Eastern Washington Sunday included the Winona Fire northwest of Colfax and the Oregon Road Fire southwest of Newport.
The air quality deteriorated to “hazardous,” as measured on South Clodfelter Road in Kennewick, late Saturday night before improving some, according to the Washington Department of Ecology’s air monitoring network.
The improvement didn’t last and before noon Sunday air quality was again rated as ‘very unhealthy.’
Most of the state of Washington was under an air quality alert on Sunday.
But air quality in the Tri-Cities was expected to improve Monday as an upper level disturbance moves into the region and the wind shifts.
The air quality alert for the Tri-Cities was scheduled to expire at 9 a.m. Monday.
The National Weather Service forecasts up to a 30% chance of rain for Monday afternoon through Tuesday night in the Tri-Cities.
Highs should remain in the 80s until Thursday, when the heat up back into the 90s, according to the weather service.
This story was originally published August 20, 2023 at 11:25 AM.