Fourth Consecutive Spare the Air Day

A fourth consecutive winter Spare the Air Day has been issued for the Bay Area on Saturday because of continued unhealthy air quality in the region.

The Bay Area Air Quality Management District announced this afternoon that air quality is expected to continue to be unhealthy and that burning wood, firelogs or any solid fuel, both indoors and outdoors, will be illegal all day Saturday.

Similar bans were also in effect for the nine-county Bay Area on Wednesday, Thursday and again today.

During winter months, wood smoke is the largest source of wintertime air pollution in the Bay Area because it contains harmful pollutants such as soot and carbon monoxide, as well as toxins such as dioxin, which has been linked to increased cancer rates in adults.

Bay Area residents must check whether a Spare the Air alert has been issued during the winter season, which runs from Nov. 1 through Feb. 29.

The daily burn status can be found at www.sparetheair.org or by calling (877) 4NO-BURN.

Those wishing to receive automatic phone calls when a Winter Spare the Air alert is issued can register at www.sparetheair.org or by calling (800) 430-1515.

--Bay City News