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EAES News

West Coast Wildfires Causing Smoke and Air Quality Concerns on the East Coast

Dr. Greg Pope, Chairperson and Professor, Earth and Environmental Studies, spoke with various news outlets on the topic

Posted in: Faculty, In the Media

Dr. Greg Pope CBS interview

Air Quality in New Jersey

Over the last few days the natural paintings by Mother Nature as you can call them are all courtesy of the wildfires in California, Oregon and Canada news, 12 New Jersey’s Marci Rubin has more on how and why the ash rom 3,000 miles away is here in New Jersey.

You can see this gray fogginess here in the lower valley. That’s the smoke. Beyond that almost visible ridge would be the Meadowlands…I can see the stadium normally. Can’t see that now.


As climate change fuels more fires out West, are dangerous smoke levels new norm for NJ?

New Jersey used to look to the east for the effects of climate change in rising sea levels and more violent coastal storms. Now state officials may have to be just as concerned about the effects coming from the west, experts say.

It’s a perfect example of the distant effects of climate change. The climate event is in the West, but it’s having a real impact on people thousands of miles away.


Wildfires scorching the West Coast create nationwide air pollution

As of Wednesday night, there were 78 active wildfires burning in the West. The fires on the West Coast, coupled with the wildfires in Canada, are blanketing much of the United States with noxious smoke affecting air quality and triggering health alerts thousands of miles away. In New York, thick clouds of smoke could be seen across the Manhattan skyline.

If fires are more frequent, if they are more intense — we could very well see more of these kinds of events


West Coast Wildfires Causing Haze, Air Quality Concerns Over Tri-State Area

All that smoke from the wildfires out west created hazy conditions here in the Tri-State Area on Tuesday. As CBS2’s Nick Caloway reports, on a normal, clear day, you can usually see Manhattan from Ridgewood. Tuesday, all you could see was a thick haze.

You can pretty much always see the skyline, at least a silhouette, if it’s a hazy day. This is unprecedented

Dr. Greg Pope

Watch the Segment from the CBS2 Evening News