MONTREAL — Canada on Friday was once again threatened by hundreds of wildfires that for weeks have displaced tens of thousands of people, consumed millions of acres and stoked alarm over the perils of climate change as hazardous smoke billowed into the United States.
The fires, which have stretched from British Columbia in the west to Nova Scotia in the east, have destroyed homes and livelihoods, diminished air quality and, at times, transformed part of the skies over Ottawa, Montreal, and Toronto into a smoggy haze.
As the smoke poured into the United States, disrupting life around the Northeast, both countries were reminded that no border can stop a spreading environmental threat.
The haze began to lift around the Mid-Atlantic on Thursday, bringing relief to millions who had breathed dangerously polluted air for two days. But conditions there and in Pennsylvania on Friday were still among the worst in the country.
Hundreds of wildfires continued to blaze across Canada on Friday, as residents braced for what could be the worst wildfire season in recent memory — and one that is far from over.
Steven Flisfeder, a warning preparedness meteorologist at Environment and Climate Change Canada predicted that the weekend could bring better air quality in Toronto, the country’s largest city and its financial capital, thanks to some rain and cloud cover near wildfire areas, with scattered rains expected in parts of southern Ontario on Sunday.
“That’s going to help flush out the contaminants from the air a little bit,” he said.
In Quebec, where nearly 150 wildfires this week diminished air quality in Ontario and the Northeast of the United States, Premiere François Legault said Thursday that the number of evacuees had hit 13,500 but that he expected that number not to rise over Friday and Saturday.
The scale of the fires has stretched firefighting capacity across the country, and firefighters from the United States, South Africa, France, Australia, and New Zealand, along with members of the Canadian Armed Forces, have been supporting local fire crews.
Drought in parts of Canada’s western provinces contributed to the early, explosive start to the wildfire season in the country, experts say. Some parts of northern Alberta, which is under a heat warning, are seeing severe drought conditions, according to the Canadian Drought Monitor, a monitoring system the federal government maintains.
The eastern half of the United States could see some reprieve from the poor air by early next week when a cold front is expected to sweep through the region, the National Weather Service said.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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