The smoke is firmly in Boise’s eyes. When can the city expect to see fresh air again?
Smoke from a nearby wildfire has made its way to Boise in ample supply, causing air quality to reach dangerous levels.
The Idaho Statesman spoke to experts Thursday to find out when the city might get its next breath of fresh air.
The answer, like the City of Trees right now, is a bit of a gray area.
But don’t expect relief anytime soon.
Les Colin, senior forecaster for the National Weather Service in Boise, said the main culprit of the smoke is the Paddock Fire, located 20 miles north of Emmett. Other fires in Idaho, Oregon and California are “minor” contributors in comparison, Colin said.
The Paddock Fire was started by a lightning strike Monday evening and had spread to 118,000 acres by Wednesday, according to the Bureau of Land Management.
The Treasure Valley’s wet spring played a significant factor in how quickly the Emmett-area blaze has grown, according to Chad Cline, spokesperson for the bureau’s Boise District Office. That extra moisture allowed vegetation to grow especially well. A summer heat wave with a long streak of triple-digit days then dried out that vegetation, creating the perfect fuel.
And northerly winds — that means winds blowing north to south — are streaming the Paddock Fire’s smoke straight to Boise and its suburbs, according to Colin.
The downtown Boise skyline barely appears amid the smoke-filled air—causing an unhealthy air quality alert for Boise and surrounding communities.
The really bad news? Colin said the smoke actually was going to get more pronounced Thursday as the day wore on, starting at about 2 p.m. The air quality will worsen through the evening and into Friday morning, he said.
“It’s going to get worse because there’s another surge of low-level smoke coming out of that fire, and the northerly winds will push it southward into our valley,” Colin said.
If you really squint, there is a slight hope far on the horizon: Weather models show that the temperature could drop noticeably in about nine days, and possibly usher in some air-cleansing rain.
But Colin cautioned that models that far out are not reliable.
“When it’s nine days away, the models are pretty erratic,” Colin said. “They can change pretty drastically from one day to another, but at least it’s in there. It’s a start.”
Until then, Boise is expected to experience varying amounts of smoke as long as the Paddock Fire is still burning — which it likely will be for a considerable amount of time.
“We’re not going to be improving drastically anytime soon,” Colin said.
The Paddock Fire reached 118,000 acres by Thursday.
Emmett fire will take time to control
The Paddock Fire was at only 5% containment as of Thursday, according to the Bureau of Land Management.
Cline said it’s too difficult to put a timeline on when the fire will be contained. It could take a few days or more than a week, he said.
“It all depends on how fast firefighters work and if the fire gets into any timber,” Cline said. “We’re trying to keep it out of the timber and keep it in the grasslands. It’s just a hard one to predict.”
And containment alone does not mean less smoke, according to the National Weather Service. Once the Paddock Fire is contained, it will take firefighters additional days to dampen it to the point of all but nullifying the smoke.
“Because this fire is bigger, it’s probably going to take awhile to reach control, because they want to make sure it’s cold,” Cline said.
The Paddock Fire lies 20 miles north of Emmett.
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