Gradually increasing winds made the air quality throughout most of the Bay Area a bit better Tuesday — but not enough to avoid another Spare the Air alert.
The Bay Area Air Quality Management District issued another alert for Wednesday, saying the smoke from the Kincade Fire is leaving enough pollution in the air to make it unhealthy.
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It will be the third straight day the air will have been that way. It also will be the sixth Spare the Air alert in the past seven days.
A respite may not come for a bit. The district is forecasting moderately unhealthy air for the majority of the Bay Area through the end of the week.
Air quality did improve through much of the Bay Area in the morning Tuesday, with the air quality index readings of fine particular matter showing levels at 11 a.m. below 50 in Concord, Oakland and Berkeley, and between 51 and 76 everywhere else.
Any reading of 50 or below is generally considered healthy air; readings of 51 to 100 are moderately unhealthy. The district did not show any readings above 150, the level considered unhealthy.
Purple Air, a company that sells air-quality sensors, measured readings of 174 and above in Sebastopol, Windsor and Santa Rosa, areas near the Kincade Fire.
That fire forced the Northern Sonoma County Air Pollution Control District to evacuate its office in Healdsburg. Information and updates regarding the air in that area can be found on the Bay Area air district’s site.
Purple Air is one several websites available that offer real-time information about air quality and smoke levels in communities across Northern California. All of the sites use the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Air Quality Index, which ranks air pollution levels on a 0-500 scale, with green and yellow being the best, and red and purple the worst.
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