(File photo/CKOM News staff)

By CKOM News

Smoke, intense heat to continue in Saskatchewan

Jul 18, 2021 | 5:11 PM

Saskatchewan won’t be getting a break from heat and smoke anytime soon.

As of Sunday morning, about 160 fires are burning throughout the province.

The smoke also led to air quality advisories across central and northern Saskatchewan for a few days.

Brad Vrolijk, a meteorologist with Environment Canada, said the worst air quality will be in the Prince Albert and Battlefords areas.

“For most places in the south, the worst of it is over now,” he said. “But then especially … across central Saskatchewan, there will definitely be periods of very poor air quality and visibility in smoke from those forest fires.”

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And it’s not just the fires in Saskatchewan that are having an effect.

“(There are) some fires over northwest Manitoba and some fires over eastern Manitoba and northwest Ontario. The various plumes of smoke from these things are swirling all over the prairies,” Vrolijk continued, before mentioning more fires in both B.C. and the United States.

“So, pretty much everywhere in the prairies is hazy, if not smoky, and that’s going to continue for the foreseeable future.”

Rain would be helpful both to battle Saskatchewan’s fire situation and for farmers who have parched fields. However, Vrolik isn’t seeing any significant rain within the next week.

“It doesn’t really look like we’re going to widespread rain anytime soon. Just more heat or more smoke seem to be the options at this point, which is rather unfortunate,” he said.

He also predicts another sweltering heatwave when the air quality improves around Tuesday or Wednesday.

“We should see daytime highs climbing into the mid, if not the upper 30’s, heading into the middle of the week.”