CONYERS, Ga. — A chemical cloud has been emanating from Conyers since Sunday after a fire broke out at the facility of a company that makes pool and spa treatments, and the sprinkler system water reacted with chemicals on site. Evacuations in the area were needed, and even surrounding counties, for a time, reported the smell of chlorine and a haze in areas.
The chemical plume has put residents in Rockdale County into a shelter-in-place order from officials from 7 p.m. until 7 a.m. until Friday, Oct. 4.
Since this started, many people in the community and surrounding areas are watching and wondering what the weather means for what they're seeing.
In previous press conferences, officials mentioned that it's easier to be outside during the day, but at night, you really want to shelter in place.
Here's why that is.
Why is the air quality worse overnight?
To describe what's happening in the atmosphere overnight and how the climate conditions are changing, let's picture two mason jars: One being larger than the other.
At the top of each mason jar, there's a lid. This lid symbolizes the top of where the weather can happen in our air.
We have a tall jar during the daytime, but at night, that jar is a little bit shorter.
But why does that matter?
During the day, we have the sun shining -- the temperatures are heating up. We have the winds flowing that are blowing all the pollution through the air. And we have that lid on the Mason jar that is really high up; that's our boundary layer.
But what happens overnight is we have our shorter mason jar, and everything gets smushed down as that boundary layer lowers. That means all of the pollution is trapped lower in the atmosphere.
That's why when people wake up in the mornings since this incident occurred, there's been a low area of the plume and also some fog in some areas. So the winds turn lighter -- it traps everything closer to the ground. And with temperatures -- an inversion above that lid -- we don't see everything scouring out until we heat up the next day.
So, that's a little bit of why we're seeing that happening overnight. But during the days, the winds pick up and that helps to improve the air quality.