It's been a hot and smoky summer. Not only have we broken records in terms of heat, but also with Reno’s air quality. The station in Reno started monitoring air quality levels in 1999, and since then we have seen a lot of smoke from wild fires. 2020 was a very smoky year, and 2021 and is proving to be even worse.
People who have lived in Reno for over thirty years says they have never seen the smoke this bad before. According to Washoe County Air Quality specialists, so far Reno has had 12 days in the unhealthy for sensitive groups range, 14 unhealthy days, and three very unhealthy days. This makes 2021 slightly worse than 2020. A few of the unhealthy for sensitive groups days were not because of smoke.
"This has been two bad summers with virus and everything. It's not much for making you happy that's for sure, said local resident Darlene Balleweg.
All of the worst particulate matter 10 days have occurred over the past 11 months. Brendan Schnieder, an air quality specialist for Washoe County says, July 4th was the last time Reno had a good air quality day. All of the days since have been in the moderate range or worse. Keep in mind the data for this year so far is preliminary. We didn't have any unhealthy days in Reno from 2015 through 2019, but in 2013 we saw four and in 2014 Reno saw three.
