A retrospective public health investigation of an urban wildfire smoke event
Kathryn Morrison
May 5, 2016
Rough Abstract
Thick smoke from an intense coastal wildfire started rolling into greater Vancouver, Canada on July 5, 2015. Smoke forecasting models from July 3rd predicted concentrations well above the recommended Canadian safety thresholds (REF). If public health officials had acted on smoke forecasts to implement exposure-reducing interventions, we estimated that XX health interventions could have been prevented, saving $X.
Introduction
- Briefly introduce the case study (what happened in Vancouver), and the wildfire smoke / health literature.
- Briefly introduce your previous work and explain what this paper will be about:
In this manuscript, we conduct a retrospective examination of the 2015 smoke event in the lower mainland of BC. We estimate the number of preventable morbidities, had public health acted on smoke forecasts to reduce population exposure. We demonstrate the use of previously developed and evaulated forecasting models for environmental health (cite my papers), to estimate the number of morbidities had public health intervention reduced smoke exposure on July 5-7.
Case study background
Timeline
TABLE: present a timeline of fires, smoke/PM forecasts, recognized health effects, and relevant media, something like:
| June 14 | Elaho fire identified\(^1\) |
| June 30 | Boulder Creek fire identified\(^2\) |
| July 3 | Smoke event forecasted for lower mainland on July 5 by BlueSky\(^3\) |
| July 4 | BlueSky forecasts continue to be high for July 5-7\(^4\); |
| Elaho fire grows rapidly overnight, smoke moves towards lower mainland\(^5\) | |
| July 5 | Severe smokey conditions in lower mainland; air quality advisor issued 3:30pm\(^6\) |
| Increases in monitored respiratory morbidities observable (dispensations, physician visits) | |
| July 6 | Smokey conditions continue; air quality advisory continues |
| Increases in monitored respiratory morbidities continue | |
| July 7 | Conditions begin to clear but still smokey; questionable advise given in media regarding masks?\(^7\) |
| Increases in monitored respiratory morbidities continue | |
- Explain each noteworthy event and the relevance. `Paint the picture’ of the scenario and why it was important and unexpected.
FIGURE(S): BCAMS showing temporal and spatial patterns/abberations?
Detailed summary of smoke forecasting ahead of smoke event
BlueSky forecasting run on May 3, 2015 at 1AM PDT
BlueSky forecasted PM2.5 for May 3 at 12:00PM PST
Results
FIGURE: Time-series of observed data with time-series of forecasted data for different intervention (exposure) scenarios
TABLE: Summary of preventable morbities by intervention type
Discussion
- What can we learn from this extreme event in 2015? How likey is it to happen again (in BC and other areas) given observed patterns with wildfire seasons/climate change over last decades.
- What are the next steps in this area? Environmental public health surevillance is increasingly important with climate change/land use changes: different types of air pollution, extreme heat, etc
\(^1\)http://bcwildfire.ca/hprscripts/wildfirenews/OneFire.asp?ID=538
\(^2\)http://bcwildfire.ca/hprscripts/wildfirenews/OneFire.asp?ID=533
\(^3\)http://firesmoke.ca/forecasts/BSC00WC04/2015070308/
\(^4\)http://firesmoke.ca/forecasts/BSC00WC04/2015070408/
\(^5\)BCCDC. ‘The 2015 forest fire season and the BC Asthma Monitoring System (BCAMS).’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25qzbS0LG6k