A ‘blanket of smoke’ falls over Sydney after backburning. Source: Sardaka, Wikimedia Commons
A ‘blanket of smoke’ has fallen across many parts of Sydney’s east, causing poor air quality, as firefighters catch up on hazard reduction burning after a damp autumn and winter.
Backburning took place over the weekend in the southwest and in the north, with smoke settling on Sunday night.
According to the NSW government’s air quality monitoring stations, the air quality in central west Sydney was deemed ‘poor’ and east Sydney was deemed ‘very poor’ on Monday morning.
NSW Rural Fire Service (RFS) Inspector Ben Shepherd said that the smoke should was expected to clear up somewhat over Monday as the day warmed up, but that further burnings may lead to more smoke until next week.
“The areas that didn’t burn during the 2019-2020 season, these burns will directly protect hundreds if not thousands of homes,” Shepherd said.
Those with asthma or lung conditions have been warned to reduce outdoor activities until smoke levels go down.
A lot of the smoke across central Sydney came from the Sutherland area in the southwest, and in Holsworthy and Hornsby, according to Mr Shepherd.
Premier Chris Minns said the back burning was necessary to help keep populated areas safe ahead of bushfire season.
“The reason for this is really straight forward, that is, that we’ve got through about 26 per cent of the hazard reduction that we need to,” Minns said.
“Obviously, everybody apologises for the haze in the air, but it’s far better than a bushfire raging down your street.”
Minns also warned that more smoke may return over Monday and today, while further burns are carried out.
“We didn’t get much burning done during the autumn-winter period because it was so incredibly wet,” he said.
“And we need to do this now ahead of hot, dry and more dangerous fire weather.”
