NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Mikel Merino can smell and see the smoke from the Canadian wildfires that are making for hazy conditions across large parts of the U.S., including northern New Jersey where he and Spain are set to face Argentina in the World Cup final on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Merino is trying not to focus on it.<\/p>\n
It remains unclear how much, if at all, the smoke will affect the final. The World Health Organization forecast calls for an improvement to \u201cmoderate\u201d air quality in East Rutherford.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor a game that is as important as a World Cup final, you have to be able to shut out external factors as much as possible,\u201d Merino said Friday. \u201cLuckily, we are being careful with every detail thanks to the federation and the organizers of the World Cup.\u201d<\/p>\n
Spain practiced outside in hazardous conditions in East Hanover, New Jersey, on Thursday, alarming experts who thought the team should have held the session inside instead. Messages sent to FIFA and the Spanish Football Association asking whether that was considered or possible were not returned.<\/p>\n
Air quality improved Friday, but the uncertainty lies in what will follow what could be up to 1.25 inches (3.17 centimeters) of rain expected to fall Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cFollowing that, it looks like there is another smoky air mass following in behind that system, but it\u2019s not clear right now how much or how it might reach New York or New Jersey, when it comes to actually Sunday,\u201d said Mark Parrington, senior scientist at the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service. \u201cIf the fire intensity really picks up again through (Saturday), it\u2019s possible it puts more smoke into the atmosphere that then might quickly follow that rain event.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smoke from wildfires \u2014 which are burning more of North America as Earth warms \u2014 attacks nearly every system in the body, killing tens of thousands of people a year, numerous medical studies show.<\/p>\n
It attacks the body immediately, spiking asthma cases with increased ambulance runs within hours. Smoke can trigger inflammation in different parts of the body, often attacking a person\u2019s weakest points, which can then cascade into different effects of an immune system trying to fight a nasty irritant, doctors and scientists say.<\/p>\n
Parrington said as a general rule the advice is to try to minimize outdoor activity and exercise when the air is full of pollutants.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s the obvious sort of respiratory illness, cardiovascular issues, vulnerable people with asthma and things like this,\u201d Parrington said. \u201cThen for sure they\u2019re going to feel the effects.\u201d<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump is set to meet with FIFA President Gianni Infantino later Friday. Members of the administration, including Andrew Giuliani, the executive director of the White House FIFA Task Force, have been discussing the matter with soccer\u2019s governing body and monitoring the wildfire situation, according to a White House official. The person was granted anonymity to confirm internal discussions.<\/p>\n
Roughly 80,000 fans are expected at the final, which takes place in the large, open-air stadium in the Meadowlands that is home to the NFL\u2019s New York Giants and Jets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Mikel Merino can smell and see the smoke from the Canadian wildfires that are making for hazy conditions across large parts of the U.S., including northern New Jersey where he and Spain are set to face Argentina in the World Cup final on Sunday. Merino is trying not to focus on … Continue reading Uncertainty clouds the forecast on whether wildfire smoke will affect the World Cup final<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1452],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1525624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":true,"date":"2026-07-19 13:34:06","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[0],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1525624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1525624"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1525624\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1525625,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1525624\/revisions\/1525625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1525624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1525624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1525624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}