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zephyr
aka friendly hiker
Joined: 21 Jun 2009
Posts: 3370 | TRs | Pics
Location: West Seattle |
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zephyr
aka friendly hiker
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 Fri Oct 21, 2022 3:23 pm |
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| HikingBex wrote: | | Snowing up at Washington Pass and even sticking to the trees a bit! |
Here's the Crystal Mountain 360 revolving web cam. Plenty of snow up there. ~z
 zimmertr  HikingBex
zimmertr HikingBex |
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Ski
><((((°>
Joined: 28 May 2005
Posts: 12832 | TRs | Pics
Location: tacoma |
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Ski
><((((°>
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 4:15 pm |
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this is SO weird....
NO rain until 10 days before Halloween?
when's the last time that happened here? 
"I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each."
 RumiDude
"I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each."
RumiDude
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Kascadia
Member
Joined: 03 Feb 2014
Posts: 651 | TRs | Pics
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Kascadia
Member
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 4:37 pm |
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What a difference a day makes.........
It is as though I had read a divine text, written into the world itself, not with letters but rather with essential objects, saying:
Man, stretch thy reason hither, so thou mayest comprehend these things. Johannes Kepler
SpookyKite89
It is as though I had read a divine text, written into the world itself, not with letters but rather with essential objects, saying:
Man, stretch thy reason hither, so thou mayest comprehend these things. Johannes Kepler
SpookyKite89
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treeswarper
Alleged Sockpuppet!
Joined: 25 Dec 2006
Posts: 11279 | TRs | Pics
Location: Don't move here |
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treeswarper
Alleged Sockpuppet!
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 4:50 pm |
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| Lazyhiker wrote: | | I hear people complaining about the present, but when asked the last time the smoke was really bad, they can’t recall. It’s been 10 years since we had smoke this bad in the Wenatchee Valley and it was much worse. We get a little smoke every fire season but it’s not terrible and it’s transient. People like to bitch about the smoke and forest closures due to fires. It’s affluenza, we’ve still got it good here. |
Let me see, I believe Wenatchee was worse than here, but maybe not in 2020, 2019 and I seem to recall hearing that doctors were sending their kids out of town to better breathing areas sometime before that. I grew up in the Wenatchee area and do not recall having such bad air in the summers.
What is funny is that nobody seems to care until the smoke goes west. Then it becomes serious.
What's especially fun about sock puppets is that you can make each one unique and individual, so that they each have special characters. And they don't have to be human––animals and aliens are great possibilities
What's especially fun about sock puppets is that you can make each one unique and individual, so that they each have special characters. And they don't have to be human––animals and aliens are great possibilities
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joker
seeker
Joined: 12 Aug 2006
Posts: 7953 | TRs | Pics
Location: state of confusion |
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joker
seeker
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 5:05 pm |
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| kiliki wrote: | | Quote: | | I know I'll be remembering this (and the last time it got FAIRLY bad but not THIS bad was in September 2020, |
September 2020 was worse. It was rated "hazardous" in the whole state then plus it was hot so it really sucked for those of us in homes without a/c or filtration. We were just stuck in the hot airless indoors with windows closed and a dog that didn't understand why walks weren't happening. The Mariners were supposed to play the Giants at home and the MLB moved the series to SF due to the hazardous air. This week in my part of the city at least we had unhealthy to very unhealthy air quality but not hazardous. (I know it was worse for people on the Eastside.) |
Yeah, this being the internet and all I should have defined what I meant by "not THIS bad". Firstly I meant for me, at our house. Inded we are up on Hollywood Hill, outside of Woodinville city limits. On many days since the Bolt Creek fire started, we've had a plume of pretty thick smoke that has poured down the Skykomish overnight, and then arced SW then S down the Snoqualmie and Sammamish valleys, and so we've been dancing on the edge of some pretty fresh and foul smoke. We were up in the unhealthy to very unhealthy ranges several times since that fire started, and in the past couple of days we were WELL into the Hazardous range - AQI at the nearby sensors was in the 350-400 range for the better part of about 36 hours or so). Back in 2020 I don't recall it getting more than briefly above 300, and then it was just barely above kind of as shown in that map in the blog entry you linked. I didn't take notes nor constantly monitor AQI (just frequently :-) ), so I may have missed a higher peak back then but it's also worth noting that this event was perceptually worse. It smelled worse - much more like being right next to a camp fire. It made both my wife and me feel more funky - more heavily irritated sinuses, lungs, and eyes. And at times, especially yesterday, we felt kinda woozy - like having taken some bad drug or something. I have a hunch that being closer to the source made this smoke worse to experience even at a same AQI level, but a quick search tells me that proper research may not yet have been done to bear that theory out (per a quick read of an EPA article that raises the question but does not answer it). In Sept 2020 btw I put DIY air purifiers (five MERV furnace fan filters carefully duct taped into a box on a pair of Lasko whole house fans) in a few of our windows on most nights and was able to get pretty decent cool air into the house, whereas this time those were not sufficient to not have the air smell and feel wretched if we did that - so instead we kept the house sealed up and used a/c some (must contract to have a heat pump installed I guess...). I wonder if this is due to there having been more combustion gases present in the air in recent weeks than back in 9/2020.
But we're splitting hairs. Both events sucked. My main point was in response to the comment further above to the effect that people don't remember when the last bad smoke event was. Seems like at least you and I both recall all too well!!
For a fair bit of this event, though, I will say that we could drive to places like north Whidbey Island, the Middle Fork valley, or even Snoqualmie Pass and get some relief. Sometimes even going to Shoreline or Seattle was sufficient to yield a 50-100 point drop in AQI making it OK to hike, walk, or bike. So if we want to define "worse" via a weighted average across the map, this may indeed have not been as bad. But damn it sucked at our house and the peak was clearly worse in our neighborhood!!
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Pyrites
Member
Joined: 16 Sep 2014
Posts: 1884 | TRs | Pics
Location: South Sound |
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Pyrites
Member
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 5:06 pm |
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Kamloops parked at greater than 500 for quite awhile a few years ago.
Keep Calm and Carry On?
Heck No.
Stay Excited and Get Outside!
Keep Calm and Carry On?
Heck No.
Stay Excited and Get Outside!
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joker
seeker
Joined: 12 Aug 2006
Posts: 7953 | TRs | Pics
Location: state of confusion |
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joker
seeker
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 6:16 pm |
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Yeah I recall that. I have some friends who live up there. Looked and sounded grim. They’re generally pretty stoic characters too
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Sky Hiker
Member
Joined: 03 Feb 2007
Posts: 1469 | TRs | Pics
Location: outside |
Still some smoke on bolt cr fire, not much for rain here.
 joker
joker |
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kiliki
Member
Joined: 07 Apr 2003
Posts: 2326 | TRs | Pics
Location: Seattle |
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kiliki
Member
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 7:02 pm |
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| Quote: | | What is funny is that nobody seems to care until the smoke goes west. Then it becomes serious. |
Well, sure, when it affects more people, like we have in western WA, more people will notice it and care. A lot of people don't care more than abstractly unless it affects them. That's how I am with, say, hurricanes. I certainly don't care as much about hurricane damage in Florida as I do about the fires in the Cascades. There is also the whole craziness of the fact that the western Cascades are having these fires.
But a lot of people have always cared. Us outdoorsy types do, or people that care about wildlife, or that just like the scenery.
zimmertr, ChinookPass, HikingBex, joker
zimmertr, ChinookPass, HikingBex, joker |
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Cyclopath
Faster than light
Joined: 20 Mar 2012
Posts: 7745 | TRs | Pics
Location: Seattle |
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Cyclopath
Faster than light
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 7:04 pm |
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| joker wrote: | | Yeah, this being the internet and all I sh |
| joker wrote: | | But we're splitting hairs. Both events sucked. My main point was in response to the comment further above to the effect that people don't remember when the last bad smoke event was. Seems like at least you and I both recall all too well!! |
This was the least bad fire season in ten or more years in terms of how many acres burned, but a very bad one in terms of smoke for Western Washington.
https://www.opb.org/article/2022/10/09/washington-wildfire-season-bolt-creek-fire-goat-rocks-fire-oregon-wildfires/
It's been hurting tourism, because people know and care and remember. No one wants to go on an expensive trip and get skunked.
rossb, gb, joker
rossb, gb, joker |
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Cyclopath
Faster than light
Joined: 20 Mar 2012
Posts: 7745 | TRs | Pics
Location: Seattle |
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Cyclopath
Faster than light
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 7:05 pm |
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RumiDude brewermd, joker |
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joker
seeker
Joined: 12 Aug 2006
Posts: 7953 | TRs | Pics
Location: state of confusion |
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joker
seeker
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 7:30 pm |
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| treeswarper wrote: | | What is funny is that nobody seems to care until the smoke goes west. Then it becomes serious. |
Define "care"
I empathize when it's not impacting me. I care that the forests are burning and that some folks are suffering and may sustain longer term lung damage. I am more likely to proactively post about it when it's my lungs that are feeling fried though. I guess I "care" more about it when it's happening out east of the Cascades but not here than I do when it's happening in Lahore, but I still "care" about the folks in Lahore and Delhi and Shenzen when their air is tragically bad. Air pollution is clearly a problem we are far from licking on this little blue marble.
gb, RumiDude, HikingBex, Cyclopath, Malachai Constant, brewermd
gb, RumiDude, HikingBex, Cyclopath, Malachai Constant, brewermd |
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RumiDude
Marmota olympus
Joined: 26 Jul 2009
Posts: 3591 | TRs | Pics
Location: Port Angeles |
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RumiDude
Marmota olympus
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Fri Oct 21, 2022 10:20 pm |
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| joker wrote: | | treeswarper wrote: | | What is funny is that nobody seems to care until the smoke goes west. Then it becomes serious. |
Define "care" |
I think in many instances people use care when what is really happening is increased discussion. And so one can care about an issue, even care deeply, yet not constantly discuss the issue. But when the issue touches one personally, then they may discuss it more frequently and with more urgency. For instance, one can care deeply about suicide. But if ones family member or close friend is a victim of suicide, then they may discuss the issue with more emotion and urgency. I think the same applies here to issues surrounding air quality from wild fires or whatever cause.
| joker wrote: | | I empathize when it's not impacting me. I care that the forests are burning and that some folks are suffering and may sustain longer term lung damage. I am more likely to proactively post about it when it's my lungs that are feeling fried though. I guess I "care" more about it when it's happening out east of the Cascades but not here than I do when it's happening in Lahore, but I still "care" about the folks in Lahore and Delhi and Shenzen when their air is tragically bad. Air pollution is clearly a problem we are far from licking on this little blue marble. |
Two quotes from David Suzuki:
"We all live downstream."
“If we pollute the air, water and soil that keep us alive and well, and destroy the biodiversity that allows natural systems to function, no amount of money will save us.”
Rumi <~~~~~cares
"This is my Indian summer ... I'm far more dangerous now, because I don't care at all."
"This is my Indian summer ... I'm far more dangerous now, because I don't care at all."
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gb
Member
Joined: 01 Jul 2010
Posts: 6311 | TRs | Pics
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gb
Member
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Sat Oct 22, 2022 7:40 am |
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| joker wrote: | | treeswarper wrote: | | What is funny is that nobody seems to care until the smoke goes west. Then it becomes serious. |
Define "care"
I empathize when it's not impacting me. I care that the forests are burning and that some folks are suffering and may sustain longer term lung damage. I am more likely to proactively post about it when it's my lungs that are feeling fried though. I guess I "care" more about it when it's happening out east of the Cascades but not here than I do when it's happening in Lahore, but I still "care" about the folks in Lahore and Delhi and Shenzen when their air is tragically bad. Air pollution is clearly a problem we are far from licking on this little blue marble. |
It is worthy of note, that all these really bad smoke years we remember have all been in the past seven years.
As to the lungs, I've started to develop asthma-like symptoms in my bronchioles when hiking certain days (and not the really bad ones). I've never had that before and it is an immune response as it treats with Benadryl. My gym climbing partner is an ER Doc locally, he says that there have been almost no beds available at hospitals in his system because of the number of pediatric asthma cases.
Studies will show substantial health effects from these strong smoke exposures, but this information is too recent and the studies will prove this out long after the fact. And then there is COPD; that will likely show up in something like 20 years.
RumiDude
RumiDude |
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Cyclopath
Faster than light
Joined: 20 Mar 2012
Posts: 7745 | TRs | Pics
Location: Seattle |
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Cyclopath
Faster than light
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Sat Oct 22, 2022 12:03 pm |
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