Brown Air Means Wildfire Season...
There was an alert in my email this morning, letting me know that our regional Fire Department and then Forest Service have raised the fire danger level to "high."
Vancouver Island viewed through a brown filter, from our back yard
I suppose we should be grateful that it managed to stay at "moderate" for as long as it has... usually 4th of July celebrations are marked by fire danger canceling all fireworks and so forth, but that was not the case this year. Similarly, our lawn is still somewhat green as opposed to just being a dried out brown tinder box in years past.
Maybe that sounds surprising to those who think of western Washington as "the rainy Pacific Northwest," but it's not that uncommon that we barely see a drop of rain between mid-June and mind-September.
But there is no mistaking that wildfire season is here, because we are seeing a greater and greater number of what I call "Brown Afternoons," where you can't really tell that the sun is out because the layer of smoke — most of which has traveled quite a long way — is thick enough that you don't even cast a shadow in the middle of the afternoon.
For the time being, our air quality at sea level remains pretty good/moderate, but as soon as you get up a couple of thousand feet you end up with some pretty murky and unhealthy stuff. Most of what we're seeing at the moment is drfiting down from fires to the north, in British Columbia.
Today was not made any more pleasant by the fact that it was also the hottest day of the year, with temperatures going over a hundred (38°C) in many locations here in western Washington. Normally this place struggles to get above 75 degrees (23°C).
Whatever your view and opinion about so-called climate change may be there's little doubt that in the 20 years I have lived here, summers have gotten considerably warmer than they used to be.
Even our little peninsula that we call home is subject to some remarkable temperature swings due to what we locally call "microclimates." For example, today it reached 90° in town, but the high down here by the waterfront on the opposite side of the peninsula got up to only 78°.
Being a cool weather person as I am, I am super grateful for the fact that I no longer live in Texas where super hot days were pretty much the norm from mid-May till the end of September. And it was relentless; there was never a break.
As I mentioned, the smoke we're seeing a lot of at the moment is actually from wildfires in British Columbia, Canada some 200+ miles to the north of us. A couple of fires up there have burned many thousands of acres and a continuing to burn somewhat out of control.
And so, we pray for rain... both "up there" and down here where we are.
Thanks for stopping by, and have a great remainder of your week!
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2026.07.23 00:06 PDT
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I'm not sure where in Canada the wildfires were last week, but oh boy, our skies were orangish from the smoke, and we couldn't go outside because it was so hard to breathe. I hope you don't have any start in your area.