For weeks now fires have been burning in Trinity County, causing myriad road closures and evacuations. As if being rerouted and displaced from wasn’t bad enough, now the concern for those who live in Trinity County doesn’t just have to do with the flames anymore, now it has to do with the smoke – particularly that they’re breathing it into their lungs.
“I heard we had the worst air quality in the world the other day,” said Josh Terranella, a bartender at the Valley View Bar and Grill in Hyampom. He said smoke from the fire has created cloudy conditions, especially for the last few days.
“Like a couple of days ago it started getting me kind of nauseous,” he said. “I had to come inside – and I was wearing a respirator.”
The North Coast Unified Air Quality Management District has classified air quality in Weaverville and surrounding areas as unhealthy. Air quality in Denny, Hayfork, and Hyampom has been classified as hazardous.
Those kinds of smoke levels put people with respiratory and heart diseases, children and older adults at high risk levels. But with visibility in the region currently being a mile or less everyone is being asked to stay indoors.
Michael Cottone, program manager with Trinity County Public Health, says the county has set up Clean Air Shelters for are residents. In each is a High-Efficiency Particulate Air Filter or HEPA unit.
“It just pumps a lot of air through it, where it can basically clean the air in a good size gym,” Cottone said. “And so what we’ve done is kind of deployed those to various areas throughout Trinity County to provide some clean air.”
There are seven Clean Air Shelters in all. They can be found in Weaverville at the Golden Age Center, in Hayfork at the Roderick Senior Center and the Murray Building next to the Sherriff Substation. At the Hyampom Community Center, the Hawkins Bar Grange, the Junction City Volunteer Fire Department #1, and in Mad River at Southern Trinity Health Services.