Los Angeles:
The forest fire that has been raging in Los Angeles city of California state of America for the last 4 days has taken a huge form. The forest fire broke out on Tuesday (January 7). At least six forests have been burning since then. By Friday the fire spread to half the city. So far 10 people have died. The fire is spread over approximately 40 thousand acres. Till now an area of ​​29 thousand acres has been completely burnt. This is the biggest fire ever in California. The surprising thing is that even after such a devastating fire and the rising plume of smoke, the air quality of Los Angeles is good. The AQI here is much better than Delhi.
AQI 154 was recorded in America’s second largest city Los Angeles on Friday. This is much better than the AQI of India’s capital Delhi. Delhi’s AQI was recorded at 372 on Friday. This falls in the ‘very bad’ category. However, air pollution has reduced to some extent in Delhi as compared to earlier. Therefore, the restrictions of Stage 3 of the Graded Response Action Plan i.e. GRAP have been withdrawn on Thursday.
Half of LA is on fire, but the air is still cleaner than Delhi’s https://t.co/hQrRvjZFXI pic.twitter.com/AdLVYRkK4u
— Abhinav Kukreja (@kukreja_abhinav) January 9, 2025
Meanwhile, on social media, users are making various comments regarding the AQI of Los Angeles and Delhi. One user on X wrote, “Half of Los Angeles is burning, but the air there is still cleaner than Delhi.”
Many users have given their feedback in the comment section of this post. One user wrote that the air quality in LA is better than Mumbai. A user has also given the reason for this. He wrote- ‘This is because of the speed of the wind and its direction. People burn stubble in Haryana and Punjab. Its effect is seen in Delhi.” Another user commented, “However, the level of air is different in Delhi. So I don’t think the comparison with a coastal city with heavy winds is very accurate.”
How many categories of AQI?
Air Quality Index or AQI is a federal measure of the amount of air pollution. An AQI between zero and 50 is considered ‘good’, an AQI between 51 and 100 is ‘satisfactory’, an AQI between 101 and 200 is ‘moderate’, an AQI between 201 and 300 is ‘poor’, and an AQI between 301 and 400 is ‘very poor’. ‘And an AQI between 401 and 500 is considered ‘very severe’.
10 thousand buildings destroyed in fire so far
Now talking about the fire in Los Angeles, there is fire in the forests named Palisades, Kenneth, Hearst, Lydia, Eaton and Sunset. Till now about 10 thousand buildings have been destroyed. These include homes of many Hollywood celebrities. 30 thousand houses have been damaged by the fire. The rescue team has asked about 50 thousand people to vacate their homes immediately. Whereas 3 lakh people have been instructed to go to safe places. The administration has warned of further spread of the fire by Saturday. Therefore, power has been cut as a precautionary measure. In such a situation, about 1 lakh people are forced to live without electricity.
Canada sent super scupper plane to help
Neighboring country Canada has also come to help extinguish the fire. Canadian firefighters have started helping the rescue team. Canada has sent its CL-415 planes called Super Scooper to California. Super-scupper planes are firefighter planes, which have the capacity to store up to 1500 gallons of water.
a suspect in custody
Meanwhile, users on social media are searching for the reason for the fire. It is being claimed on one such platform that a person started setting fire in the forest, which spread and took a huge form. Amidst these alleged rumours, the Los Angeles Police has detained a suspect. However, the Fire Chief there David Acuna has rejected this claim.
