Health Watch: Fairbanks Memorial Hospital opens clean air rooms for those vulnerable to wildfire smokeFAIRBANKS, Alaska - As wildfires rage across Interior Alaska, smoke has settled into the Tanana Valley, obscuring visibility and irritating lungs across the community.
They are equipped with HEPA filters to clean and scrub the air of harmful particulate matter. “We’ve had these machines for a number of years, and we keep them maintained, and so set up was pretty easy. It takes about 30 minutes to set up the rooms,” said Fehr. However, those interested do not have to demonstrate a need in order to use the room, said Fehr. “We monitor it to just make sure that we have people just abusing it because we want to make sure it’s available to the folks that need it.”
The hospital has been hosting this program as part of its emergency plan for a number of years. “We set this up any time there’s a major fire like this,” Fehr said.This time, however, Fehr said people have come from the community seeking a break from the outside air. “We’ve had a handful of folks come in and use them for different durations.”