Air quality in the Boise area was at unhealthy levels Thursday as fires in Central Idaho and a new fire southeast of Boise continued to burn.
The Boise, Meridian and Nampa areas were showing levels in the red category, which means all people may experience health effects and members of sensitive groups may have more serious impacts, said Michael Toole, the regional airshed coordinator at the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality.
Toole said the Treasure Valley was getting a lot of drainage smoke from fires in the state. It’s also still cool in the morning and there’s an inversion in place, so smoke lingers close to the ground, he said.
The Plex Fire, which started Wednesday evening southeast of Boise, grew to 350 acres by 8 a.m. and was impacting air quality in that area. Unofficial monitors in the area were showing levels in the red and even the purple zones, Toole said, but that would not be surprising given the location of the fire and the weather conditions.
“Hopefully, as the inversion lifts later this afternoon, temperatures warm up, that smoke will lift more and allow for levels to come down,” he said. “It’s just an unfortunate location for that fire, and the time of day is not good either, so there’s probably going to be a lot more smoke in that Southeast Boise area.”