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Clean air agency reveals how they measure your unhealthy air

An app has gained popularity in Seattle for comparing the level of air pollution to the number of cigarettes one would smoke in a day, but the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency says analyzing air quality is a lot more complicated than the app might make it seem.

KIRO 7 showed the app, which stated that the air quality in Seattle on Wednesday was equivalent to about 8 cigarettes, to air monitoring specialist Graeme Carvlin.

“That’s not a particularly useful comparison because the types of particles that you're breathing in are completely different, -- cigarettes and wildfire smoke,” Carvlin said.

The data input to the app comes in real-time from the World Air Quality Index.

You can find the free app in your app store.

The app also doesn’t take into consideration just how long you’re in the air.

Analyzing air for the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency’s daily public alerts, Carvlin said, is a whole other story.

Its station in the SODO neighborhood, one of its biggest, has seven air monitors that measure air quality in several ways, including analyzing the fine particles in the air to find out what metals are in them to track down where they’re coming from.

Another measures the mass of the particles, and yet another breaks down the types of particles in nanograms per meter cubed.

“Right now we’re seeing a lot more of that wood smoke signal,” he said. “Normally, at this site, which is an area right next to a road, we see a fair bit of diesel.”

“What’s normal levels for wildfire smoke here?” KIRO 7 reporter Linzi Sheldon asked.

“You might see 600,” Carvlin said.

The monitor read over 8,600 nanograms per meter cubed on Wednesday afternoon.
Tilman Parramore Jr. didn't let the smoke and haze interrupt his fishing at Gas Works Park, though it was a different view than he's used to.

“It's kind of weird looking at Seattle,” he said. “It's not pretty much there.”

As for the app's reading?
"I'm skeptical," he said.

It was a shocking idea to Connie and Rachel Kim, who were visiting from Hawaii.

“Oh, Lord!” Connie Kim said. “That's crazy.”

She said it was their first time visiting Seattle.

“They told us the weather was always kind of cloudy and gloomy, so when we got off the plane a couple days ago, we thought this was normal,” she said. “And then we turned on the news, and they said the air quality’s not great today!”

Carvlin said the level of particles has not dropped from Tuesday and won’t get much better until the wind picks up.

Click below to enlarge screenshots from the app used in Seattle on Aug. 20.

Screenshots from the "Sh**t! I smoke" app. In Seattle, August 20.

More smoke-related news from KIRO 7:

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