Read it and wheeze: Ozone hits early

[TexasStooge]

N. Texas: Expert says red alert last week isn't clear signal for summer

By JIM GETZ / The Dallas Morning News

FORT WORTH, Texas - North Texas' annual bout with high ozone levels had residents, especially those with asthma or other breathing problems, seeing red earlier than usual this year.

A monitor at Meacham Airport in Fort Worth indicated Tuesday, the first day of summer, was also the first day this year to hit the red ozone level – considered unhealthy for anyone doing prolonged or heavy exertion outdoors. Except for an aberrant, very unhealthy May 31 in 2003, it was the earliest day with a red alert or higher since at least 1997.

The Dallas-Fort Worth region also marked its second-earliest orange-level day in that period on May 6. An orange-alert day is considered unhealthy outside for sensitive groups – senior citizens, children, outdoors workers and people with illnesses or unusual susceptibility.

So with the early start and the National Weather Service predicting hotter-than-normal temperatures from July through September, does that mean we're in for the worst ozone summer in years?

Not necessarily.

"Unfortunately, there's not any good guidance we have to tell us what will happen in August, and August is what will make or break the season," said Bryan Lambeth, senior meterologist at the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. "What happens in June doesn't have much effect on August. Last year was a fairly quiet year ... but the bottom line is it's fairly rare to have two quiet years in a row."

If August is even partially rainy or even cloudy, that will reduce high ozone levels, he said, as would a change in the weather pattern that brings Midwestern air with high background levels of ozone into Texas. That pattern was responsible for the higher levels last week.

The pattern was so bad that it delivered haze all the way to Big Bend and Guadalupe Mountains national parks in West Texas.

Still, it does not appear the conditions led to a bump in respiratory illnesses. Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas and John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth reported no increases in emergency room visits due to breathing problems. Neither did the Denton and Eagle Mountain-Saginaw school districts, within which the highest readings occurred this week.

"For the most part, if it is a red ozone day, they don't go outside," spokeswoman Kristen Escovedo said of the 1,120 Eagle Mountain-Saginaw students attending summer school.

Although he's unable to predict as far as August, Mr. Lambeth foresees more of the same in the near future. With temperatures in the mid- to high 90s and winds consistently out of the southeast or south-southeast, areas in the northern and northwestern parts of the region should expect another orange-alert day today.

"This stagnant pattern in the middle of the country is persisting," he said. "Fortunately, the air in Texas is coming from the south and not the east, so we're just getting a touch of [the bad air]. But if we get a little shift, we could get that blob coming at us again."