Canadian officials said that the fires have extended from British Columbia on Canada’s West Coast to Nova Scotia, almost 2,900 miles east.
US states and cities issued air quality alerts and officials warned residents to stay indoors or take other precautions.
According to reports, Canada’s Minister of Emergency Preparedness, Bill Blair, told reporters last week that throughout the month of May, wildfires had burned about 2.7 million hectares, or about 6.7 million acres of forests in British Columbia, Alberta, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Ontario and the Northwest Territories. Blair said on Twitter that the fires have burned the equivalent of more than five million football fields.