The past week has been a bad one for wind and smoke.

On Sunday while driving home in howling winds I saw some smoke off in the distance.

I knew that there were fires well to the north, but didn’t think that we would have heavy smoke like this in the valley.

It was soon apparent that there was a fire somewhere close. You could also see that there was definitely a heavy wind from the north.

The air quality in the valley was already in the hazardous category from all the dust coming from freshly worked fields, and the smoke from the fire added to this.

As I drove north I finally could see that the fire was west of Vernalis and east of I-5.

Luckily the wind was blowing to the south or the smoke would contribute to the already bad air at home.

I found the NOAA smoke forecast and it looks like it is going to be very smoky this weekend in the Central Valley from the fires to the north. This is not good for the air quality. The current AQI is almost at 100, and I hope that it will not get too much worse. If it does I may not be able to do yard work this weekend.

I hope that the fires to the north are controlled soon and that the smoke diminishes. I really feel for my cousin who lives closer to the area of the major fire.

Steven