Air quality worsens as wildfire smoke blows into the Central Valley

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Smoke moved into the Valley overnight arsenic wildfires proceed to pain crossed Central California.

"If you unrecorded successful a foothill community, you astir apt woke up to the odor of fume and person been dealing with it for days," Heather Heinks astatine the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District said.

Heinks says 2 fires are having the biggest interaction connected the Fresno area.

To the north, the Pedro Fire successful Mariposa and Tuolumne counties has burned implicit 3,800 acres. To the south, crews are battling the SQF Lightning Complex occurrence that has charred tens of thousands of acres since mid-July.

"The upwind absorption has been mostly retired of the north, and we are close downwind of (the Pedro) fire," Action News AM Live Meteorologist Christine Gregory said. "We've benignant of been caught successful the mediate of some that fire, and now, we're seeing winds shifting much retired of the south."

The aerial prime has worsened from "good" to "moderate" successful immoderate parts of Fresno, Clovis, and the South Valley. People with respiratory issues are present astatine hazard owed to particles successful the smoke.

"Even the astir steadfast individual, erstwhile exposed implicit clip to PM2.5 volition consciousness shortness of breath, scratchy throat, possibly a headache. Just a small feeling of unwell," Heinks said.

With storms successful the forecast, determination are increasing concerns that play lightning strikes could spark caller fires, putting radical and spot astatine hazard and perchance worsening the Valley's aerial prime adjacent further.

"With this tropical moisture moving in, determination is interest for immoderate tempest development, specifically implicit the High Sierra," Gregory said.

"We're precise acrophobic for the imaginable for caller fires," Heinks said. "So, portion we mightiness beryllium "moderate" now, it's a precocious hazard this weekend, truthful you should conscionable beryllium alert."

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