Unbreathable air
On winter weather, statistical patterns, and the dangerous air hanging over Chicago because of wildfires in Canada
The overall statistics on Canadian wildfires are jarring, and the spread of smoke occupies a huge amount of map space. The day-to-day situation looks pretty troubling, with more than 200 fires currently rated “out of control”.
■ There are harrowing scenes coming from within the fires themselves and distressing pictures from far away in places like Chicago, which is experiencing the worst recorded air quality in the history of measurement due to a thermal inversion that’s trapping the smoke near the ground.
■ What’s a bit strange is how the year doesn’t seem like much of a statistical aberration: We’re just beyond the halfway point in the calendar year, and even if the total area burned doubles from this point, it still wouldn’t look like an outlier for this decade (far more acreage burned in 2023). The same goes for the simple number of fires.
■ That unfortunately means the long-term forecast could be grim, especially if winter precipitation remains in short supply and chronically higher temperatures contribute to drying out more of the potential wildfire fuel. The changes don’t have to be binary to be problematic: Incrementally higher temperatures can mean incrementally drier vegetation, leading to a chronic state of larger fires with more resulting smoke.