Cough, Hack Wheeze!

Don't Let the Smoke get in your...

It's been smokey here in Southcentral Alaska the last week or so. A stationary high pressure system is trapping all the smoke from 61 active forest fires. The biggest fire is 79,000 acres near Nenana, north towards Fairbanks. This afternoon the visability dropped as the smoke got thicker. This morning I could make out the hazy outlines of the eastern edge of the city from my pearch on the 14th floor near the western edge of Anchorage. I was watching pilots doing touch and goes at Merrill Field at lunch time. Now I can see about a mile into the smoke. Merrill field is not visible and about an hour ago hour ventilation system stopped being able to filter the smoke. It smells like a campfire in my office.

UPDATE:

In addition to smoke being transported into the Anchorage Bowl and Prince William Sound from fires in the Copper River Basin, the National Weather Service issued the following Information Statement early this afternoon;


PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE ANCHORAGE AK
138 PM AKDT WED JUL 8 2009

...WIDESPREAD HAZE AND SMOKE ARE OCCURRING ACROSS SOUTH CENTRAL ALASKA TODAY...
A FIRE ON THE KENAI PENINSULA HAS INCREASED IN INTENSITY OVERNIGHT AND PERSISTENT
SOUTHERLY WINDS HAVE TRANSPORTED THE SMOKE NORTH. SOUTHERLY WINDS AT AND ABOVE
THE SURFACE WILL CONTINUE TO MOVE SMOKE NORTHWARD THROUGHOUT THE DAY. RESTRICTED
VISIBILITIES AS A RESULT OF THE SMOKE AND HAZE ARE EXPECTED TO FLUCTUATE OVER THE
NEXT SEVERAL DAYS.