By Mark Woolsey

There’s a reason for the high-level haze that’s settled over Cobb County and a large part of Georgia the last couple of days.

Strong northwesterly winds have brought smoke from roaring Canadian wildfires into the region, with some of that smoke penetrating as far south as the Gulf Coast. 

“The cold front which came through a couple of days ago….allowed the smoke to come into our area,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Carmen Hernandez. She says the smoky haze began to be visible on Saturday.

Canadian officials said that as of Monday, some 181 wildfires were reported across several provinces, with 90 classified as out of control and 62 said to be under control. Some 25 thousand people were evacuated, mainly in Manitoba. Dry weather is being blamed.

 South of the border, air quality alerts were put into place across the upper Midwest, with some spots in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Michigan Upper Peninsula threatened with “unhealthy” pollution levels.

It’s mostly an upper-level phenomenon in our area, she said, although she noted Atlanta was under a “moderate” air quality advisory Monday.  That means air quality Is acceptable for most people, but that it could pose a problem for a small number of people who are unusually sensitive to air pollution. The main pollutant reported was PM2.5, or fine particulate matter.

Some help is on the way.

“We are expecting improvement Tuesday night into Wednesday,” Hernandez said. “The winds will become more easterly” and that will result in an expected drop in the amount of smoke filtering into the area.

She said a handful of calls had come into their office asking about the haze.