Canadian wildfire smoke returning to East Coast - and will stick around for days

Washington DC, Boston, Baltimore and Philadelphia are also seeing hazy skies on Thursday

Smoke from Canadian wildfires will bring hazy air to New York City and several major cities on the east coast.

The moderate air quality caused by the smoke will linger through at least Friday before heavy rain hits the Big Apple, the National Weather Service said on Thursday.

“You may notice hazy skies today. It is coming from wildfire smoke, which has overspread across the area from north to south,” the NWS said on X. “We expect this to stick around for the next several days. Not expecting harmful impacts to air quality, at this time.”

People who are “unusually sensitive” to poor air quality, such as those with asthma or other breathing conditions, should “consider making outdoor activities light and short,” according to the NWS.

Rain is then expected to hit New York this weekend, the NWS said.

Canadian wildfire smoke is causing hazy air in New York City and several other major east coast cities until the weekend (AFP via Getty Images)

High atmospheric pressure is pushing the smoke over Canada and across the east coast.

The wildfires will also bring hazy air to much of the east coast, hitting major cities like Boston, Washington, DC, Baltimore and Philadelphia.

There are 155 uncontrolled wildfires, while another 297 are either controlled or being held, according to the latest wildfire report from the Canadian government, released August 7.

Last year, Canada faced brutal wildfires fueled by the climate crisis that brought dangerous levels of smoke to the east coast.

As a result, these fires burned an area larger than the state of West Virginia and funneled more heat-trapping carbon dioxide into the air than India did by burning fossil fuels in 2023, a recent study revealed.

The human-caused climate crisis will continue to create prime conditions for destructive wildfires as global temperatures increase, making rain more erratic and droughts more prolonged and intense.

Climate scientists say that it is very likely 2024 will be the hottest year on record globally, following the record-setting temperatures of 2023.

While the air quality isn’t expected to become widely dangerous, prolonged exposure to unsafe air can have health consequences, such as difficulty breathing, and in the long-term, heart disease and cancer, according to the National Institutes of Health.

As a result, some 135 million people have died in the last four decades from air pollution, a recent study from the Nanyang Technological University of Singapore revealed.