There’s an Easy Way to Protect Your Home from Wildfire Smoke
A new study finds that toxic gases from wildfire smoke often find their way indoors. The good news is, straightforward cleaning can significantly reduce the risks.
Dangerous particles and gases from wildfire smoke can find their way indoors.
Photographer: Philip Pacheco/BloombergWhen wildfire smoke comes to town, the first order of business is to try and avoid it. Many Americans learned this over the summer as toxic smoke repeatedly drifted down from Canadian forest fires and forced millions of people to stay indoors.
“The first thing is to go inside and close all the windows and doors,” says Delphine Farmer, a chemistry professor at Colorado State University. But the particles and gases in wildfire smoke can still “creep in through the edges of windows, cracks in the foundation,” she says. That’s why people in smoke’s path are advised to use high-quality air filters (such as a HEPA or MERV13 filter), set central air-conditioning to recirculate indoor air and layer in air purifiers to reduce pollutants like dust, molt, bacteria and allergens.