Wildfire smoke continues to blanket parts of B.C., improves slightly over Vancouver

Wildfires burning near Hope and Manning Park, and in the Peace region, Kootenays and U-S Pacific Northwest have all combined to blanket much of BC under a smoky pall.

The BC Air Quality index shows the level of potentially harmful particulates linked to the smoke are especially high in Cranbrook, Castelgar, Squamish and Whistler.

Environment Canada is maintaining air quality statements across the lower third of BC and in the northeast where two large fires have forced evacuation orders and alerts west of Fort St. John and southeast of Tumbler Ridge.

The BlueSky Canada smoke forecasting system shows smoke will continue to smudge BC skies for at least another day but the ranking that measures the worst air quality on the planet has dropped BC from the top of the list on Sunday to 15th worst today behind Dubai and cities in Pakistan, China, Chile and India.