{"id":8682,"date":"2026-07-17T14:18:04","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T09:18:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=8682"},"modified":"2026-07-17T14:18:04","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T09:18:04","slug":"summer-is-smoke-season-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=8682","title":{"rendered":"Summer is smoke season now"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/qVUPT6D2RQX46yGrdzua5fVoJbo=\/2026\/07\/16\/1784221143666.jpeg\"> <\/p>\n<div>Toronto pedestrians walk as wildfire smoke turns the skies orange. Photo: Cole Burston\/AFP via Getty Images<\/div>\n<p>The wildfire smoke drifting into the eyes, throats and lungs of millions of Americans and Canadians this week is a stark reminder that the planet is changing in unsettling ways.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The smoke, from wildfires raging in northern Minnesota and Canada, is causing dangerously bad air across the Midwest and Northeast \u2014 and could soon waft elsewhere.<\/li>\n<li>Air quality alerts have been issued in New York, Chicago, Toronto and more, with officials urging folks to stay inside.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr>\n<p><strong>Zoom in: <\/strong>It&#8217;s too early to tie these wildfires directly to climate change. <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>But researchers have shown that human-caused climate change is making wildfires both more likely and more intense.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>One headline finding<\/strong> from a Climate Central <a href=\"https:\/\/www.climatecentral.org\/climate-matters\/climate-change-worsens-wildfire-smoke-2025\" target=\"_blank\">report<\/a> last year: &#8220;Per-person exposure to harmful wildfire smoke in the U.S. was four times higher during 2020-2024, on average each year, than during 2006-2019.&#8221;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Moreover,\u00a0it&#8217;s impossible for those of us in the smoke zone to avoid thinking about climate change as the skies turn to an ominous rust and our lungs begin to sting.<\/li>\n<li>The fires themselves have also <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/news\/canada\/wildfires-northern-ontario-federal-help-9.7272287\" target=\"_blank\">destroyed homes<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mprnews.org\/story\/2026\/07\/16\/boundary-waters-businesses-hit-during-peak-season-by-wildfires\" target=\"_blank\">devastated local tourism<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/71ahd3rItlN0MYSDSXLtDvoUrEQ=\/2026\/07\/16\/1784222547693.png\"> <\/p>\n<div>A satellite view of wildfire smoke across the Midwest and Northeast. Image: NOAA\/STAR<\/div>\n<p><strong>The big picture: <\/strong>Massive smoke events like this have happened before \u2014 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2023\/06\/27\/smoke-unprecedented-canadian-wildfires-chokes-upper-midwest\" target=\"_blank\">most notably<\/a> in 2023.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>They may get more common as North America&#8217;s forests keep drying up, creating ideal conditions for megafires sparked by lightning and other causes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>What&#8217;s next: <\/strong>Hot and dry conditions mean the fires causing the smoke could keep burning for some time \u2014 and there&#8217;s elevated risk of new fires.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>We may get periods of reprieve as the smoke stays high (possibly painting our skies but sparing our lungs), or gets carried elsewhere.<\/li>\n<li>At least one model suggests that the smoke could pour southward next week \u2014 reminding us that there&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2023\/07\/18\/best-worst-states-for-climate-change-extreme-weather\" target=\"_blank\">no safe port<\/a> in a changing climate.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The bottom line: <\/strong>Americans out West have long understood &#8220;fire season.&#8221; The rest of us need to start thinking about &#8220;smoke season,&#8221; too.<\/p>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Toronto pedestrians walk as wildfire smoke turns the skies orange. Photo: Cole Burston\/AFP via Getty Images The wildfire smoke drifting into the eyes, throats and lungs of millions of Americans and Canadians this week is a stark reminder that the planet is changing in unsettling ways. The smoke, from wildfires raging in northern Minnesota and&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8683,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/qVUPT6D2RQX46yGrdzua5fVoJbo=\/2026\/07\/16\/1784221143666.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8682"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8682\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}