On many Fourth of July holidays, including yesterday, our Airway Heights air monitoring site measures high spikes of fine particle pollution (smoke) due to a nearby fireworks display. The smoke levels measured were so high that the 24-hour average (midnight to midnight) was still in the Unhealthy/Red range on the Air Quality Index (AQI).
The AQI report for the county reflects the highest reading from the monitoring network, which reached the Hazardous range last night based on Airway Heights. Other locations were reporting Good to Moderate.
While localized issues near monitoring sites can affect the overall AQI reported, it doesn’t happen very often. Checking the air quality monitoring map is a way to see if a localized issue is affecting air quality near you. The map is on our Current Air Quality webpage here: spokanecleanair.org/current-air-quality/
