Worst Smog In Decades Creates Health Threat In Marina Del Rey

LOS ANGELES, CA — The air in Los Angeles reached a choking level of ozone not seen in a generation during the Labor Day weekend heat wave, according to air quality readings.

According to the South Coast Air Quality Management District, lung-damaging ozone spiked to 185 parts per billion in downtown Los Angeles Sunday. Such levels have not been seen in 26 years, the Los Angeles Times reported Friday.

Blame it on the heatwave and on climate change. The heat combined with stagnant weather conditions and winds that were too weak to sweep away much pollution combined to trap the pollution above the Southland. Temperatures in Los Angeles County exceeded 120 degrees Sunday for the first time on record, thanks to a high- pressure system that also trapped dirty air close to the ground and allowed smog levels to build up.

Climate change is an underlying cause of the increase in smog, according to air quality experts cited by The Times. Scientific studies have found that rising temperatures are making smog harder to control by speeding up the photochemical reactions that generate ozone gas. And wildfires, which are growing more intense and destructive with the warming climate, only spew more smog-forming pollutants into the air.

The ozone reading were so far off the charts this week that officials, they triggered a quality control check designed to prevent the release of erroneous data, air quality officials told The Times.

The figures were not reported immediately because the quality control check requires additional, manual validation if pollution readings exceed historic highs, South Coast AQMD spokeswoman Nahal Mogharabi told the newspaper. If instruments are having problems, they "can show erroneously high levels and the quality control check prevents the automated release of high data that could be incorrect."

But it was no glitch.

"The value for noon on Sunday has been reviewed and is preliminarily valid at 185 ppb," Mogharabi said.

The eight-hour average ozone level in downtown L.A. was 118 ppb, "very unhealthy" on the Air Quality Index and far above the federal standard of 70 ppb. The last time ozone readings were that high in downtown L.A., by either measure, was in 1994, at a time when emissions were much higher and smog dramatically worse, The Times reported.

Southern California has long suffered the nation's worst levels of ozone. The corrosive gas, which inflames the lungs and triggers asthma attacks and other health problems, is not emitted directly but forms when pollution from cars, trucks, factories and other sources bakes in the heat and sunlight. So it's no coincidence that the highest ozone readings usually happen when the weather is hottest, The Times reported.

City News Service and Patch Staffer Paige Austin contributed to this report.