Plan for smoke; real time AQI and smoke forecasting tools

 Air quality got you down? While it seems to have cleared up a bit in my neck of the woods, I can still feel it in my lungs when I go for a run. As much as I'd like to think we are through the worst of it, we are likely only halfway through the wild fire season and these moments of reprieve from smoke laden air may just be moments. Let's hope that's not the case!

Screenshot from windyty.

 When the smoke was at its worst here in the Kootenays, I started looking up real-time air quality index (AQI) reports and smoke forecasting tools with the hopes of finding at least slightly better air quality for recreating in. Here are some tools I found:

aqicn.org
This website offers AQI ratings all over the world based on live measurement from specific areas. You can see 48 hour history and they offer a forecast as well. 

firesmoke.ca
This website is a forecasting tool specifically for wildfire smoke and displays data graphically over a map. 

windy.com
This is both a website and a mobile app. It's better know for weather forecasting, but they also have a CO concentration layer that can be used to forecast wildfire smoke. 

 I hope that these tools will help you find cleaner air for planning activities!