Smoke from wildfires continues to plague the Treasure Valley. Forecasters say things will get worse before they get better.
Winds are out of the northwest Friday and expected to be again Saturday. That will actually bring more smoke into the Treasure Valley.
Valerie Mills is a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Boise.
She says the air quality will likely deteriorate this evening, thanks to the northwest winds. The quality of tomorrow morning's air will also be poor.
“So especially actually in the morning, from about 8 to 10 Saturday, looks a lot like Thursday, where it was pretty smoky and visibility was down to four miles,” says Mills.
But forecasters say there may be a break on the horizon with improvement on Sunday and Monday, as winds switch and start coming out of the south.
“Currently there aren’t as many fires upstream to the south in northern California and southeast Oregon as there are in northeast Oregon and central Idaho, where our smoke has been coming from the last few days.”
Mills says thunderstorms, forecasted for next Wednesday night and Thursday, could also help with the smoke, but Mills cautions it could also start more fires. She is currently watching a system that may come to Idaho a week from Sunday with more rain.
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