As smoke from Canadian wildfires continues to impact air quality across our region, a conservation specialist in Elk County is encouraging people to take the haze seriously.
Emma Walters with Keystone Country Alliance says anyone spending long periods outside should take extra precautions, including children and older adults.
Walters says with the summer months, many tourists and campers are outside in the wilderness, and could be highly impacted.
Health experts warn the smoke can cause headaches, dizziness, and shortness of breath if inhaled for long periods of time.
“Big thing with any animal species right now in the wild is gonna be the smell. We can smell it when we walk outside our doors. Just imagine how much more they can smell it.
So it’s gonna be hard for predators to smell prey and prey to smell their predators. That’s the big thing that I think would affect them. We’re not having the fire heat that we would
if we had a wildfire here in Pennsylvania. So they’re not necessarily gonna move away from the smoke.”
Officials say the smoke is expected to last Thursday and into Friday, with experts warning to limit time outdoors as much as possible.