Riding in the smoke....or not.
 

Was planning on a fast century with friends Saturday morning.

Uhh, maybe not?

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...343401ca7.jpeg

Oof. Sorry, dude. Been there, done that, have the Zwift miles to show for it.

Bummer! While you are comfy indoors, read this great book about a big MN fire.:thumb:

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...965e47d7d9.png

Yeah, thinking about that. I don't know that the indoor air quality is really much better, though. Old house without central air (and central air doesn't filter for pm2.5 anyway) and so windows are open in some rooms.

Then again, when I go outside right now, it smells of woodsmoke, but it doesn't smell that way indoors. So there is some difference. I guess the particles settle in the stagnant air inside a house.

Buy air purifiers. Get your exercise indoors through this.

On the worst days last Fire Season we kept the house closed up - not obsessively, of course, because we have dogs. But all the windows shut. And yeah, the particles do settle out over time. I also kept a sharp eye on local air quality monitors on Purple Air, so I could see plumes coming before they arrived, and act before the bad air got in.

Looks like a good read.

Way back when, I spent the weekend on Fire Island at a friends beach house. I brought along a brand new book (which was not yet a movie).

Jaws.

Poor timing, I think..

You should stay inside and hide.

Next door to you in WI...I'm going riding.

Tomorrow's smoke forecast. Most of it will be aloft here, I don't know if that's the case where you are.

https://wildfiretoday.com/wp-content...smoke.ca_..jpg

Keep track of it on Purple Air.

I'm looking at the same question. Doesn't look good thought, I'm hoping if I get out early the air should be reasonable. Otherwise it will be another day on the rollers.

Where are you in WI? Unless you're in the far west, AQ will be much better in WI than MN.

Maybe I should drive east for a ride. Or up to the lake.

Here in So Cal we have "fire season" every Aug/Sep and I just cancel any rides when the air is that bad. It sucks, but some of the damage it can do to your lungs (in addition to what our wonderful smog already does) is permanent.

We have been SO lucky in the Bay Area this year, so far. Just a bit of good air near the coast. Nothing like last year, which was horrible.

One wind shift will change that in a hurry.

That would have been a good idea some days ago. Too late now for the weekend....

We've been lucky here, too. Last year a group of us rode into a smoky area, we thought the wind would keep it away. We turned back but it was awful. My breathing is bad enough already but that hurt for some time after.

Keep an eye on the air quality before you leave. Drive somewhere cleaner if possible. Be aware of the distinction between ground level and aloft, I'm not seeing what's headed your way.

You can probably buy purifiers in a brick and mortar store. You can make them out of box fans and HEPA filters.

We don't really know all of the health consequences of breathing this smoke. We know particulate matter can get deep into your lungs and we know it can cause cancer. We know it isn't just trees in the smoke, hundreds of structures have burned, there's paint in the smoke and who knows what else.

Ugh, what I had seen previously was that this was expected to clear this evening. I skipped my ride this morning, just based on how bad it was last night, and was hoping to make up for it tomorrow.

I'm a long way from those fires in New Hampshire but I have been noticing for some time now that the sky just does not look right. Even on cloudless days the sky has a haze that looks curiously like the smog you would see in ads from the 1960's showing how bad the air was in Los Angeles. I have observed something else and it has to do with temperature. Normally here in July and August it is in the 90's continuing all the way into September. But it has been cold here and very windy. Perhaps a meteorologist on this site can chime in? Are those particles messing up New England weather?

Yeah, me too. Instead, it looks like it will get worse. I know a bunch of people who will be riding this weekend anyway. I'm not.

This is Eastern Manitoba that's burning. There aren't any buildings there. It's pure natural Canadian woodsmoke.

<cough cough>

Yeah, when the smoke is high, it does funny things to the light, without necessarily causing poor air quality on the ground. We get a lot of that in Minnesota summers now - from the west and from Canada. We can have cloudless days when the sky is not blue, you can barely see the sun, and there are no shadows until the late morning, even with not-so-bad air quality on the ground.

We had that earlier in July. But now the smoke is on the ground and the pm2.5 levels on the ground are setting state records.

There are lots of possible explanations for your New England weather. High smoky haze can be one of them, but drawing a direct cause and effect would be unwise without a log of meteorologic detail about specific recent weather patterns there - air masses, wind directions, etc.

I'm pretty sure the locall stores are all sold out, just ilke they sold out of window a/c units during that nasty heat wave in June. I just ordered a unit in Amazon that should arrive Sunday A.M. I hope.

Every time we get a heatwave, I think, "I should wait for the next cold snap and buy a couple A/C units and some fans!" And then when it cools down, I forget.

FYI, the NOAA Smoke Prediction map is a good page to bookmark:

https://hwp-viz.gsd.esrl.noaa.gov/smoke/

Select the Near Surface Smoke option.

I admit that I haven't let the smokey skies affect my goals. I've gone out in the mornings before the heat and humidity sets in, and so far I haven't felt any effects, except that third arm that gets in the way! LOL
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...3de87b60e0.jpg
55 miles today, 54 yesterday, 48 on Wednesday.