Smoke returns to NJ from Canada — how bad will it be?

🔥 Air quality issues are possible this week as smoke drifts here from Canada

🔥 Hundreds of fires still burn out of control

🔥 Will it get as bad as it did in June?

Smoke from hundreds of Canadian wildfires will drift into New Jersey again this week.

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection has declared an Air Quality Action Day for Particulate Matter.

"Sensitive individuals, including those with heart or lung disease, the elderly, and the young should limit strenuous activities and the amount of time active outdoors," according to the DEP notice.

The Environmental Protection Agency lists most of New Jersey with moderate air quality, but a band that stretches from Hunterdon, Somerset and Middlesex counties is forecast to have unhealthy air quality for sensitive groups.

While moderate danger from smoke will exist in the Garden State this week, it will not be as severe as conditions in early June when the smoke blanketed all of New Jersey and turning the sun red and darkening the sky.

How many fires are still burning?

The Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre lists nearly 900 fire burning throughout the country.

Of those, some 580 are considered out of control.

More than 24-million acres have been burned during the worst wildfire season in Canada in four-decades.

For comparison: The area burned in Canada is four-times the size of New Jersey.

When will the fires be put out?

That is difficult to say.

Despite round the clock efforts of thousands of firefighters, that will not be enough to end the conflagration.

Sustained heavy rains are needed and there just hasn't been enough to wet the ground to prevent further spreading.

Some experts have suggested that some of the fires could burn for months, if not years.

Cooler and wetter weather that typically arrives in the Fall could help squash some of the smaller fires and allow fire crews to surround the bigger ones and allow them to burn out.