BALTIMORE – An eerie orange haze has been blanketing much of the Northeast and mid-Atlantic due to massive wildfire smoke blowing into the U.S. from Canada, and while conditions have improved in the New York City area and New England Thursday, the wildfire smoke has made its way down the I-95 corridor through Philadelphia and into cities like Baltimore and Washington.
Because of this, millions of Americans across the region have been placed under air quality alerts because of the hazardous conditions.
With the exception of far western Maryland, most of the state has been placed under “Unhealthy” Air Quality Index (AQI) levels, with some areas, like Baltimore, being placed into “Very Unhealthy” and even “Hazardous” levels.
The air quality may continue to deteriorate as wildfire smoke continues to push farther south during the day on Thursday.
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Impacts from the Canadian wildfire smoke in Maryland are expected to stick around.
On Thursday, an area of low pressure swirling off the Northeast coast will drift a little to the west, shifting the worst smoke to the south and west of New England, impacting cities like Baltimore.
WILDFIRES CAN BE DANGEROUS TO YOUR HEALTH EVEN IF YOU’RE NOWHERE NEAR ONE
More than 100 million Americans across the eastern half of the country are under Air Quality Alerts on Thursday.
Baltimore is among the cities across the eastern half of the U.S. under Air Quality Alerts, including other major metropolitan areas like Washington, Philadelphia, New York City and Norfolk, Virginia.
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Cities up and down the East Coast are among those with the worst air quality in the country.
At one point, Washington was seeing “Hazardous” air quality levels but has since fallen back into the “Very Unhealthy” range.
Other cities listed in “Hazardous” and “Very Unhealthy” levels include Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and Rolling Meadows, Delaware.
WHAT IS THE AIR QUALITY INDEX?
A regular assessment of air quality in the United States started in 1976, about six years after the Environmental Protection Agency was created.
According to AirNow.gov, the law requires any metropolitan area with a population of more than 350,000 to report air quality daily.
The Air Quality Index we know it today was released in 1999, according to AirNow.gov. It has gone through several updates over the years, but the goal has always been the same — to offer people an easy-to-understand daily report about the air they’re breathing and indicate what air quality is dangerous.