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Smokey Saratoga Summer: A Look at What’s Causing Air Quality Levels to Drop

Written by Aidan Cahill on . Posted in Featured, News.

For the second week in a row, a haze fell over Saratoga County as wildfire smoke continued to penetrate the landscape.

On Aug 4 and 5 Federal and private monitors in the capitol region showed air quality index levels above 100 — making the air unsafe for sensitive groups — while some monitors in Saratoga County showed air quality levels above 150 — dangerous for all people.

With the continued downturn in air quality, Saratoga TODAY looked at what’s causing this problem and whether it will get worse.

What’s causing drops in air quality?

In the US, air quality drops have been associated with smoke coming from wildfires currently taking place in Canada. Smoke from fires over 1000 away from Saratoga has been travelling southeast, across the Midwest and into New York.

According to the latest situation report from the Canadian Interagency Forrest Fire Centre (CIFF), there are currently 737 active fires impacting the country. Of those, 504 are considered out of control with 199 receiving a full response and 305 receiving a monitored response.

Where are the fires taking place?

The fires are taking place largely beyond where most of the population of both Canada and the US would be directly impacted by the blazes. According to CIFF, most of the fires are taking place out west in the northern parts of Western Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. There are also clusters of fires in Canada’s Northernmost territories of Yukon and Northwest Territories, as well as out east on the island of Newfoundland.

A map of the wildfires in Canada. Red dots indicate a fire that’s out of control and receiving a full response, purple indicates a fire that’s out of control but being monitored, yellow indicates a fire that’s been held to a specific area and blue indicates a fire that’s been contained and in the process of being extinguished ( Courtesy of CIFF)

While Canada is the second largest country in the world by landmass, most of it’s population is clustered in major cities such as Toronto and Montreal in the east and Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver in the west, according to population maps from statistics Canada.

As a result, most of the fires are taking place far away from population centers. While there have been multiple evacuation orders in the provinces impacted by the blazes, many of these are primarily in small rural communities.

Is this normal?

Across North America, wildfires are a natural phenomenon. In Canada specifically, the fires serve to help a forest recycle debris and prevent build up, according to Parks Canada.

Fire is also one of the ways forestry services deal with wildfire conditions. As part of many forest management plans, agencies will start fires in what are prescribed burns, according to the National Park Service. These fires reduce fuel build up and allow an area to go through its natural processes in a more controlled way. Fires are even used locally in Saratoga National Park to help keep the battlefield in similar condition to what it was during the battle 250 years ago.

While fires themselves may be natural, the current conditions aren’t. Since 1983, when data on wildfires was first collected and reported in Canada, there has been only two fire seasons worse than the one currently being experienced — 1994 and 2023.

These worsening fire conditions have been attributed to climate change. According to Natural Resources Canada, because the air is becoming warmer and drier, wildfire seasons have been getting longer and more intense. This can be seen in drought conditions which show much of Canada experiencing abnormally high levels of dryness — particularly in areas currently dealing with the fires.

Canada has also had to deal with “zombie fires” or fires that lay dormant beneath the permafrost and snow for months before sparking back up when conditions are ripe for fires, according to NOAA.

How does this compare to the US?

Despite sharing a long border and working together on many wildfire responses, there are some notable differences between how the US and Canada experience and deal with fires.

The first major difference is human settlement in fire prone areas. In the US, settlement in wildland areas has gone up by nearly 50% in the last 40 years, according to a study funded by the US Forest Service. This number equates to 32% all housing in the US being in the wildland areas as of 2020.

Meanwhile in Canada, according to data from the Canadian Journal of Forest Research, 12.1% of Canadians live in wildland areas with an estimated 17% of those being in wildfire prone areas.

Beyond just having a lower population in wildland areas, Canada also has fewer fires started by humans. In the US, an estimated 85% of fires are started due to human interaction — be it accidental or due to negligence, according to the US Forest Service.  Canada meanwhile sees the majority of their fires sparked by lightning strikes. In 2023 — the worst fire season on record — 93% of fires were as a result of lightning strikes with the remaining 7% caused by humans according to a study by Canada’s natural resource department.

What’s the impact on Saratoga?

In light of the of these fires, the New York Department of Health has advised residents to keep an eye on air quality levels and consider moving events inside — especially for those in high-risk groups.

“Poor air quality can pose serious health risks — especially for those with heart conditions, lung diseases, such as asthma, young children, those over 65 years old and pregnant individuals,” New York State Health Commissioner Dr. James McDonald said “To reduce exposure, limit strenuous activity outdoors. We encourage all New Yorkers to visit airnow.gov for the latest air quality forecast and be on the lookout for Air Quality Health Advisories from the Department of Environmental Conservation and the Department of Health.”

Hello! My Name Is Blotto – The Movie! Set To Premiere at Cohoes Music Hall in April

Written by Thomas Dimopoulos on . Posted in Entertainment.

By Thomas Dimopoulos

Saratoga TODAY

SARATOGA SPRINGS – It was Aug. 1, 1981 – the premiere of MTV – and three dozen songs into the playlist, up came the video of Blotto’s “I Wanna Be A Lifeguard.”

Upstate New York rock band Blotto experienced national success in the 1980’s through touring, record sales, radio airplay and exposure of their videos on that then-brand-new music cable station MTV.

A new documentary film – featuring a broad and entertaining look at the career of the band – was created by Rob Lichter.  Hello! My Name Is Blotto – The Movie! Is set to premiere at Cohoes Music Hall on Saturday, April 12.

The film spans the origins of the band members starting as The Star-Spangled Washboard Band in the 1970’s, their evolution to Blotto and heyday in the 1980’s, and their long afterlife up to the present. 

Blotto enjoyed a wide and loyal following for their music and engaging live shows that would find Bowtie, Broadway, Sarge, Cheese and Lee Harvey (mostly) good-naturedly lampooning a grab bag of musical genres.  

In August 2017, Haymes graciously accepted an invitation to speak at a History of Rock & Roll in Saratoga event this writer was hosting at the Saratoga Springs Public Library.

Haymes, who died in 2019, was prolific writer, musician, visual artist and supporter of the Capital Region arts scene for several decades. He was also a co-founding member of the band Blotto and its predecessor, the Star-Spangled Washboard band – of the early 1970s.  

“We played a couple of shows at Caffe Lena, and within a year we played at SPAC, opening for Sha Na Na,” recalled Haymes.  “Star-Spangled Washboard Band lasted through about September ’78 and everybody went their separate ways and got real jobs. Our bass player, Cheese Blotto, got a job bartending at his friends who had just opened a bar that was called 17 Maple Avenue. In the back there was a stage, probably about six inches high, tops. Cheese struck a deal with (the owner) that if he could get some friends to come up and play in the back room then he would still get paid his bartending fee, but he wouldn’t have to actually bartend. So, every weekend he would call up and say: hey, you want to come up this weekend?” said Haymes, who would take on the moniker Sarge Blotto

“Eventually it coalesced into a group and we needed a name. We came up with the name Blotto. We came up with these little cardboard convention badges that would say: Hello My Name Is. That became the title of our first record: Hello My Name is Blotto.

“There was a night, later on, late in the evening, we’re doing our third set or something and there’s a group of gentlemen who come in and stand in the back. Big poodle hair. Satin baseball jackets with the sleeves pushed up. This was like ’79. So naturally we started making fun of them. They’re a band? Ahaha. It’s a Friday night and they’re not playing anywhere,” Haymes recalled.

-Hey, you wanna come up and jam?’

-Oh yeah, sure.

“So we did ‘House of the Rising Sun,’ and ‘Johnny B. Goode,’ because everybody does ‘Johnny B. Goode,’ and I think we also did ’We Gotta Get Outta This Place..’  Maybe four guys came up – and they were pretty good! We were very impressed. After our set, it was time to say thank you and wrap up the night. We asked them who they were. Neal, Steve…it was Journey. Earlier that evening they had played at SPAC. Ha. They were pretty cool about it.”  

Two years later I was in Colonie Center, somebody said ‘Have you seen the poster?’ We had to go to Spencer’s Gifts and in the back there were these racks of posters and there’s a Journey poster. They’re just kinda standing there. There are some green trees and some white pillars and I’m looking at it and saying, ‘Yeah, it’s Journey. And?’”

“No, look closer, look closer.”

“I looked and hanging from (drummer) Steve Smith’s belt is a cardboard tag: Hello My Name is Blotto. What’s Yours?”

This film is the brainchild of Rob Lichter, aka Bert Blotto, a multimedia expert and longtime friend of Blotto. He recorded performances and interviewed the band over the last 25 years to capture the material for the documentary. He also incorporated a vast collection of archival footage and photos going back as far as 1972. The result is a fun, lightly censored, self-effacing romp through the improbable life and times of the members of Blotto.

The premiere performance of the film will take place at Cohoes Music Hall, 58 Remsen St. in Cohoes on Saturday, April 12. VIP Reception, cash bar and hors devours opens at 5 p.m. and the film screens at 7, with a Q&A to follow at 9.  VIP Reception and admission (limited availability) is $40, and Regular admission is $25.  For more information and tickets, go to:    www.blotto.net or www.guthriebellproductions.com.