Smoke from a forest fire near the Boundary Waters Canoe Area up close to the Canadian border made its way into the Twin Cities today, or so says the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. I was home today and noticed a wood smoke of sorts around 12:45 PM. As polluted as North St. Paul is with all the wood and yard waste burners around here, I thought that someone was burning waste in their backyard at first. After the smoke got heavier, leaving a heavy haze visible in the air, I realized that it was more than just a regular backyard burner. While the smoke made the air hazier than normal in North St. Paul, the smell of the wood smoke did not come close to approaching what we regularly experience in this town. The smoke covered most of the Twin Cities, reportedly extending from Maplewood and White Bear Lake all the way down to Minneapolis and beyond to Shakopee.
All you people finding this blog by searching for the cause of the wood smoke in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area on Friday, September 9th, 2011, should know that we regularly have heavier wood smoke than this in North St. Paul. Living in North St. Paul is like living in hell. So if you didn't like the smoke you experienced today from the BWCA forest fires, don't think about buying a house in North St. Paul because this city is much worse.
12:45 PM: A faint to light smoke is in the air that smells like some sort of wood. I figured someone was burning in their backyard, as happens every miserable day in this horrible city.
1:00 PM: A moderately strong wood type of smoke is in the air. The air is hazy at this time. We don't usually see a smoky haze in the air like this from the nightly burning that happens in this city. The odor of wood smoke is often much heavier than this in North St. Paul.
2:00 PM: Light wood type smoke in the air. The intensity of the smoke has decreased.
3:00 PM: A faint wood type smoke continues.
4:00 PM: The smoke is almost completely gone.
5:00 PM: The smoke from earlier is now gone. 85 degrees, sunny, a very nice day.
6:00 PM: No smoke.
7:25 PM: No smoke.
After dark, I went out near Silver Lake looking for smoke. There were homes burning on Lake Blvd. Wednesday and yesterday and I found another one burning tonight. That's three evenings in a row that a home on Lake Blvd. was burning. A home on Lake Blvd., which happens to be directly behind city council member Jan Walczak's home, was having a very smoky bonfire. They had another very smoky bonfire earlier this year and may have had more. I don't go looking for burners over at Silver Lake that often. There was no breeze at this time, but the smoke was drifting south. I could not smell the smoke along Lake Blvd. or along Helen St., but the wood smoke was very heavy on 19th between Helen & Lake. I also found more wood smoke on 19th near Longview from a home on Longview that was burning, sending flaming embers up into their neighbor's tree. Assholes who burn wood are not cautious about fire safety. You will see these recreational burners doing dangerous things all the time like having a huge bonfire right next to their neighbor's wooden fence.
8:00 PM: No smoke where we are.
8:25 PM: Faint wood smoke. I knew the air would be smoky. Earlier, the smoke from the two fires I found was drifting south. I guess the burner producing the smoke we smell is to our north. No matter which way the wind blows, the air is smoky every evening in this horrible nightmare city. North St. Paul sucks!
9:00 PM: Faint wood smoke continues.
9:40 PM: Faint wood smoke continues.
10:00 PM: Light wood smoke. The smoke is getting heavier. It looks like the air conditioning will have to remain on all night long. There is no chance of opening the windows any time soon.
10:45 PM: Light wood smoke.
11:00 PM: Light wood smoke continues. This was the last check of the night.
The air was fresh when I woke Saturday morning. It's common in North St. Paul for people to leave their bonfires smoldering all night long. It happens all the time. But not this morning.