{"id":20089,"date":"2025-01-15T21:58:19","date_gmt":"2025-01-15T22:58:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=20089"},"modified":"2025-01-15T23:32:10","modified_gmt":"2025-01-15T23:32:10","slug":"even-homes-that-evade-the-fire-face-toxic-ash-risk-studies-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=20089","title":{"rendered":"Even Homes That Evade the Fire Face Toxic Ash Risk, Studies Show"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Armed with two garden hoses hooked up to a sputtering tap, Matthew Craig battled fire and smoke to save his house from the onslaught of flames that devastated much of Altadena, a once leafy corner of Los Angeles County. The wind felt like dragon\u2019s breath, he said, and \u201cwe were all eating smoke.\u201d<\/p>\n

But even though his home is secure, for now, it will be a long time before he and his family feel safe enough to go back. Every room in the house, he said, was covered in ash, dust, soot and dirt that the high winds had blown inside. \u201cMy 5-year-old son, wife, dog and I don\u2019t want to be living in a toxic wasteland.\u201d<\/p>\n

As residents start returning to neighborhoods ravaged by fire, they are contending with a slew of toxic hazards in the lingering smoke and ash that experts say can cause breathing problems and worse.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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When neighborhoods go up in smoke, they burn all manner of human-made materials \u2014 vehicles, lead pipes, paint, plastics \u2014 which can release toxic smoke and fumes that can linger. A recent study found that even for homes that are spared destruction, smoke and ash swept inside could adhere to rugs, sofas and drywall, creating health hazards<\/a> that can remain for months.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThere are so many people who have lost their homes in this, and that is devastating,\u201d said Colleen Reid, who studies the health effects of air pollution at the University of Colorado Boulder, and who led the research. \u201cBut even the people who feel lucky that their home is fine \u2014 they could actually be exposed to lot of toxic materials,\u201d she said. \u201cThe wind will get through every crack.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Armed with two garden hoses hooked up to a sputtering tap, Matthew Craig battled fire and smoke to save his house from the onslaught of flames that devastated much of Altadena, a once leafy corner of Los Angeles County. The wind felt like dragon\u2019s breath, he said, and \u201cwe were all eating smoke.\u201dBut even though his home is secure, for now, it will be a long time before he and his family feel safe enough to go back. Every room in the house, he said, was covered in ash, dust, soot and dirt that the high winds had blown inside. \u201cMy 5-year-old son, wife, dog and I don\u2019t want to be living in a toxic wasteland.\u201dAs residents start returning to neighborhoods ravaged by fire, they are contending with a slew of toxic hazards in the lingering smoke and ash that experts say can cause breathing problems and worse.When neighborhoods go up in smoke, they burn all manner of human-made materials \u2014 vehicles, lead pipes, paint, plastics \u2014 which can release toxic smoke and fumes that can linger. A recent study found that even for homes that are spared destruction, smoke and ash swept inside could adhere to rugs, sofas and drywall, creating health hazards that can remain for months.\u201cThere are so many people who have lost their homes in this, and that is devastating,\u201d said Colleen Reid, who studies the health effects of air pollution at the University of Colorado Boulder, and who led the research. \u201cBut even the people who feel lucky that their home is fine \u2014 they could actually be exposed to lot of toxic materials,\u201d she said. \u201cThe wind will get through every crack.\u201dWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20091,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20089"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20089\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20092,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20089\/revisions\/20092"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20091"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}