Canada wildfires are burning. Why aren't Hoosiers seeing as much smoke as last summer?

Last summer, smoke from Canadian wildfires caused several days of dangerously unhealthy air for Indiana. But while wildfires are still burning up north, the smoke hasn’t been as bad for Hoosiers.

Eric James works for NOAA’s Global Systems Lab, which helps develop models to predict weather and air quality. He said you need a lot of fires to get really bad air quality in a place far from the source like Indiana and last year more fires were active earlier in the season.

“I remember last year there were lots of really big fires, even in May and June. This year, the fire season seems to be a little bit longer to get going. So, now it's very active," James said.

READ MORE: How to protect yourself from wildfire smoke
 

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James said the other factor is the wind direction.

“So even if you have lots of smoke in the atmosphere, if the wind is not blowing in your direction, you may not have much of an air quality impact," he said.

James said that wind is blowing toward Indiana as consistently as it was last year.

READ MORE: Why it’s hard to forecast wildfire smoke

With Canada in a long-term drought, he said we’ll probably see the smoke affect Indiana for years to come — but how much could vary from summer to summer.

NOAA has a new, easy-to-use tool that shows smoke forecasts across the U.S.

Rebecca is our energy and environment reporter. Contact her at rthiele@iu.edu or follow her on Twitter at @beckythiele.