As the Hazen Fire burns south of Buckeye, air quality for the rest of the Valley is expected to worsen.
That’s because a low pressure system coming from California is pushing winds from west to east. Wind gusts are expected to be the strongest in the afternoon and evening and could hit 30 miles an hour.
Those winds are blowing black smoke clouds over much of the Valley, as the invasive Salt Cedar bush continues to burn.
Michael Graves with the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality says that combined with low cloud cover and small rain chances are creating conditions for fine particulate matter to spread.
“It’s the kind that can lodge deeper into your lungs, so that’s gonna be a bit worse for health potentially than the larger particles like in dust,” Graves said, “people who are sensitive to that, who have respiratory disease, may wanna, limit their time outdoors, just kind of monitor their health, if you’re smelling smoke, you’re breathing it,” Graves said.
Graves says the wind is helping to prevent the smoke from settling, but it’s also making it easier for the fire to spread. Winds could slow and temperatures could rise come Wednesday when the system moves out.
The Hazen Fire southwest of Buckeye grew to almost 1,000 acres over the weekend and remained totally uncontained on Monday morning.