Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

cliffmass.blogspot.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 332 posts

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#151

Post by wnissen »

lacker wrote: post #39
dthal wrote: post #29

This blog post went up on Saturday, September 12. It says: >> MUCH cleaner air will push in by 4 PM Sunday over the coastal zone and will just reach Seattle late in the afternoon >> By 1 AM Monday, air quality will be hugely better in western Washington As of now (Tuesday) there is no sign of clearing. Here in Seattle we are still in the "very unhealthy" range for AQI.

Yeah, the weather forecasts for air quality have been quite inaccurate. Since Friday, the projections for Oakland CA have constantly been, “it’ll clear up in the next 24 hours.” Only now, Tuesday morning, has the AQI dropped below 100. It seems like it’s just a harder problem than regular weather forecasting. Nobody has much experience with giant smoke clouds like this one. So I can forgive the weather service some i…

Yep. Predictions are obviously hard, but there's no wind to blow the smoke away, so I don't know why it is routinely predicted to do so 48 hours in the future. There is enough smoke piled up over the ocean (at least to judge from the satellite pictures) that it would take several days of steady winds to clear everything out. Any wind strong enough to theoretically clear the smoke quickly would probably spark new fires instead. And yet even with multiple fires nowhere near containment, the Spare The Air forecast still says "moderate" air in two days. I'll believe it when I breathe it.

The "incident meteorologist" for the North Complex fire was quoted yesterday as saying there was no system predicted that would cause a notable improvement in air quality for the next two weeks. Again, assuming no new fires, which is a stretch given that we're right in the middle of the traditional fire season.

The only forecast I rely on is the National Weather Service. Their site is painfully dated but the accuracy is unmatched.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#152

Post by ipsum2 »

pc86 wrote: post #57
londons_explore wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In % of land area burned, the fires are pretty small. Far less than 1% of the US land area burned this year. So, given the same weather conditions, you should expect more fires next year.

Weren't these fires caused by a party?

This is a perfect illustration of how news and social media propagate false news while technically still being correct. The gender reveal party contributed to 8,600 acres on fire. However, >1 million acres were started by lightning[0], but get a lot less coverage unless you're in the affected areas. But the party gets more attention, because it's more interesting/easier to be outraged over that.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_California_wildfires#List...

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#153

Post by ALittleLight »

Qub3d wrote: post #112
hguant wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I'm not looking forward to any smoke now my dad has COPD, IPF, is on oxygen, and he's elderly. If we get any amount of smoke here it will be the end of him. It's hard enough trying to keep him from contracting SARS-Cov-2 and developing covid-19 Seriously, get a HEPA rated air filter. Speaking as someone who has some serious lung issues, it's literally life changing/saving. Honeywell sells a number of models, cost is…

The University of Michigan made an instructional video showing how you can easily make an air purifier out of a box fan and a HEPA-rated furnace filter for $25: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kH5APw_SLUU It won't be as good as a purpose-built machine, but it will be far better than nothing at all. TheWirecutter found it reduced particulate matter in a room by 87%, if you do it right. They also make clear important c…

I have two of these running right now. According to my air quality meter, PM 2.5 has fallen from about ~250 indoors to ~40. (My meter shows ~600 outside, which is about 3x what the government website shows for my area)

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#154

Post by BurningFrog »

derwiki wrote: post #18
tyleo wrote: post #2

I’m in the midsts of this right now and it’s depressing. I spent yesterday morning with a sore throat and itchy eyes and most of the afternoon hopelessly driving hours away for a box fan and furnace filter (I finally found them). All the while I should have been working. Some of my coworkers have complained of week-long headaches. If anyone else is suffering from this: you are not alone.

I’ve been using an app that converts AQI to equivalent cigarettes smoked per day. It’s not perfect but it’s something I can wrap my head around as a meaningfully bad number.

And you don't even get the nicotine kick.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#155

Post by sershe »

derwiki wrote: post #18
tyleo wrote: post #2

I’m in the midsts of this right now and it’s depressing. I spent yesterday morning with a sore throat and itchy eyes and most of the afternoon hopelessly driving hours away for a box fan and furnace filter (I finally found them). All the while I should have been working. Some of my coworkers have complained of week-long headaches. If anyone else is suffering from this: you are not alone.

I’ve been using an app that converts AQI to equivalent cigarettes smoked per day. It’s not perfect but it’s something I can wrap my head around as a meaningfully bad number.

These apps really put this into perspective for someone who used to smoke a pack a day 15 years ago :) So I guess spending all day outdoors is not THAT bad?

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#156

Post by brewdad »

pc86 wrote: post #53
x86_64Ubuntu wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you mind giving your state? I'm on the east coast so I don't expect to have any problems like anyone in Idaho or on the West Coast.

Even thought some smoke has reached the east coast for pretty much everything east of the Mississippi there is no change in air quality (yet?)

Most, if not all, of the smoke traveling that far will be up near the jet stream level of the atmosphere. It will impact your sunlight but will have little to no effect at ground level.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#157

Post by ALittleLight »

derefr wrote: post #93
londons_explore wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In % of land area burned, the fires are pretty small. Far less than 1% of the US land area burned this year. So, given the same weather conditions, you should expect more fires next year.

That isn’t the statistic I would expect to be pulled out here. Not all land area has any chance of catching/spreading a fire. Fires don’t really spread through rainforest; they definitely don’t spread through rocky areas; nor, really, through swampland; nor across mountain ranges; nor through irrigated cropland. (Nor through modern concrete cities, but city land-area is negligible.) There’s definitely some portion of…

This propublica story has a lot of detail on the fires. They estimate that there are ~20 million acres overdue for burn and the fires this year are burning about a million acres. If I understood it correctly a million acres burning a year is about what's required for stasis, but the 20 million acre backlog will need to be burned too.

https://www.propublica.org/article/they-know-how-to-prevent-...

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#158

Post by GaryNumanVevo »

lacker wrote: post #39
dthal wrote: post #29

This blog post went up on Saturday, September 12. It says: >> MUCH cleaner air will push in by 4 PM Sunday over the coastal zone and will just reach Seattle late in the afternoon >> By 1 AM Monday, air quality will be hugely better in western Washington As of now (Tuesday) there is no sign of clearing. Here in Seattle we are still in the "very unhealthy" range for AQI.

Yeah, the weather forecasts for air quality have been quite inaccurate. Since Friday, the projections for Oakland CA have constantly been, “it’ll clear up in the next 24 hours.” Only now, Tuesday morning, has the AQI dropped below 100. It seems like it’s just a harder problem than regular weather forecasting. Nobody has much experience with giant smoke clouds like this one. So I can forgive the weather service some i…

I've found the HRRR experimental smoke models to be quite good. It's a bit cumbersome to use, but good enough for 18H forecasts

https://rapidrefresh.noaa.gov/hrrr/HRRRsmoke/

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#159

Post by pmiller2 »

amluto wrote: post #150
pmiller2 wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have COPD or other serious lung issues, don't get just one HEPA filter. These machines are rated to filter the air in an area that's certain number of square feet, based on how many CFM of air they move. Get at least enough of them that your whole living space is covered, and deploy them throughout the entire dwelling. You may want more individual machines so you can run them on a lower fan setting, which prod…

The area covered is somewhat useless — actual coverage depends hugely on how leaky the building is and how windy it is. The goal is to get enough air through filters that the incoming smoky air is diluted enough by filtered air to achieve a good average particle count. A handheld particle counter helps a lot.

What you say is true as far as it goes. It also depends on the height of the ceiling, because it's actually about a volume of air rather than a surface area of floor space.

What you really want to know is how long it takes to recirculate the entire air volume of the space you're interested in. But, for a typical dwelling that has ~10-ft ceilings and isn't too leaky, that square footage number is a really good guideline.

Re: Smoke has caused temperature forecasts to go crazy

#160

Post by marcosdumay »

larrik wrote: post #94
naivedevops wrote: post #8

Meanwhile, in Sao Paulo we are getting to 34C (93F) every day, and even the nights have been extremely warm. And here at the southern hemisphere it's winter now.

What are winters normally like? You seem to be about as far from the equator as places like Miami, so I'm not sure what to expect.

At São Paulo, it should be usual to have days where the maximum temperature is around 15°C, but most should reach high 20's. It should rain a lot of the time too, but with a small amount of water.

But hot and dry days are not unheard of, they are just unusual.

Post reply on HN