LAKEPORT, Calif. — A Christian school in Lakeport closed on Monday after receiving a bomb threat.
Lakeport Police Lt. Dale Stoebe said the threat was sent via email to Konocti Christian Academy, which is located on the Lake County Fairgrounds at 401 Martin St.
“The KCA received an email that had approximately 30 additional addressees, that included Anti-American rhetoric and the threat of an explosive device on campus with a set detonation time,” Stoebe said.
Stoebe said that, at that time, local and regional threat assessment information centers had no similar information from other locations.
“When presented with all of the known information, school administration elected to exercise an abundance of caution and send students home,” Stoebe said.
He said that a search was conducted of the campus with no suspicious objects located.
The school did not immediately respond to a message sent via email by Lake County News Monday afternoon seeking comment.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife and partners have confirmed the presence of New Zealand mudsnails, or NZMS, at Warm Springs Fish Hatchery near Lake Sonoma.
While NZMS have been detected in other portions of the watershed, this is the first confirmed detection at Warm Springs Hatchery.
NZMS were detected in an intake pipeline and an aeration pond during a regularly scheduled quarterly hatchery survey this summer.
Since the detection, scientists have conducted surveys in about 75% of Coho-bearing streams in the watershed and have not observed NZMS presence beyond previously known locations.
Warm Springs Hatchery operates production and release programs for Coho salmon (a federal and state-listed endangered species) and steelhead (federally listed threatened species).
The NZMS surveys have focused on stocking locations for these fish species, which are conducted mostly in Russian River tributaries in the lower basin.
“The detection levels so far have not been alarming, but we want to do everything we can to minimize the spread,” said CDFW North Central Regional Manager Morgan Kilgour.
Dense populations of NZMS can displace and out-compete native species; they may consume up to half of the food resources in a stream and have been linked to reduced populations of aquatic insects, including mayflies, caddisflies, chironomids and other insects important to trout and salmon.
Invasive NZMS were first discovered in California in 2000 in the Owens River. It is believed that the species was introduced to western rivers through shipments of live sportfish, but subsequent spread is likely due to recreational activities.
Dry Creek, which flows by Warm Springs Hatchery, has previously been identified as positive for NZMS. The source of the recent NZMS detections is unknown, but it is suspected that the snails came to the hatchery via its source water of Lake Sonoma.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, or USACE, operates the Russian River Coho Salmon Captive Broodstock Program at Warm Springs Fish Hatchery, and contracts with CDFW to operate its steelhead program. In addition to the surveys, CDFW has increased biosecurity measures at the hatchery.
The hatchery will continue to operate its Coho and steelhead programs. CDFW is working with USACE and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, which permits the hatchery, to determine if any changes in Coho release protocols are needed given the detections.
“NOAA Fisheries fully supports CDFW and the USACE’s efforts to minimize the risk of further spread of aquatic invasive species such as NZMS within the Russian River and other watersheds that provide critical habitat for listed salmon and steelhead,” said Robert Coey, north central coast supervisor in NOAA Fisheries’ West Coast region.
Boaters, anglers and others who visit the Russian River watershed are asked to decontaminate equipment and follow the “clean, drain and dry” directive with all equipment used in the river:
• If you wade, freeze waders and other gear overnight (at least six hours). • After leaving the water, inspect waders, boots, float tubes, boats and trailers or any gear used in the water. • Remove any visible snails with a stiff brush and follow with rinsing. If possible, freeze or completely dry out any wet gear. • Never transport live fish or other aquatic plants or animals from one waterbody to another.
Additional information about stopping the spread of NZMS can be found on CDFW’s California’s Invaders: New Zealand Mudsnail webpage.
Raise your hand if you regularly find yourself walking up a flight of stairs. What about carrying heavy bags of groceries? How about picking up your child or grandchild? Most of us would raise our hands to doing at least one of those weekly, or even daily.
As people age, it can become more and more difficult to perform some physical tasks, even those that are normal activities of daily living. However, prioritizing physical fitness and health as you get older can help you go through your normal day-to-day routine without feeling physically exhausted at the end of the day.
It can also help you continue to have special memories with your family and loved ones that you might not have been able to have if you weren’t physically active. For example, I ran two half-marathons with my dad when he was in his 60s!
I am an exercise physiologist who studies how people can use resistance training to improve human performance, whether it be in sports and other recreational settings, in everyday life, or both. I am also a certified strength and conditioning specialist. My career has given me the opportunity to design exercise programs for kids, college athletes and elderly adults.
Staying physically active as you get older doesn’t need to include running a half-marathon or trying to be a bodybuilder; it could be as simple as trying to get through the day without feeling winded after you go up a flight of stairs. Although our muscles naturally get weaker as we age, there are ways we can combat that to help improve quality of life as we get older.
Muscle loss and chronic disease
One of the most important parts of exercise programming, no matter who I am working with, is proper resistance training to build muscle strength. Some amount of age-related loss of muscle function is normal and inevitable. But by incorporating resistance training that is appropriate and safe at any ability level, you can slow down the rate of decline and even prevent some loss of muscle function.
In one of our team’s previous studies, we saw that otherwise healthy individuals with sarcopenia had issues delivering vital nutrients to muscle. This could lead to greater likelihood of various diseases, such as Type 2 diabetes, and slow down recovery from exercise.
Recent estimates suggest that sarcopenia affects 10% to 16% of the elderly population worldwide. But even if a person doesn’t have clinically diagnosed sarcopenia, they may still have some of the underlying symptoms that, if not dealt with, could lead to sarcopenia.
Strength training is key
So the question is, what can be done to reverse this decline?
Recent evidence suggests that one of the key factors leading to sarcopenia is low muscle strength. In other words, combating or reversing sarcopenia, or both, may be best done with a proper resistance-training program that prioritizes improving strength. In fact, the decline in muscle strength seems to occur at a much faster rate than the decline in muscle size, underscoring the importance of proper strength training as people age.
Continuing to regularly strength train with moderate to heavy weights has been shown to be not only effective at combating the symptoms of sarcopenia but also very safe when done properly. The best way to make sure you are strength training properly is to seek out guidance from a qualified individual such as a personal trainer or strength and conditioning specialist.
Despite the clear benefits of strength training, it’s been shown that only about 13% of Americans age 50 and older do some form of strength training at least twice a week.
Finding what works for you
So how does a person properly strength train as they age?
The National Strength and Conditioning Association, a leading organization in advancing strength and conditioning around the world, states that for older adults, two to three days per week of strength training can be incredibly helpful for maintaining healthy muscle and bone and combating a number of chronic conditions.
The organization recommends that these workouts involve one to two exercises involving multiple joints per major muscle group, with six to 12 repetitions per set. These are done at an intensity of 50% to 85% of what’s known as one-repetition maximum – the most weight you could handle for a single repetition – with the exception of body weight exercises that use one’s own body weight as the resistance, such as pushups.
I would also recommend resting for about two to three minutes between sets, or even up to five minutes if the set was challenging. For older adults, particularly those age 60 and older, the National Strength and Conditioning Association guidelines suggest that a program like this be performed two to three days per week, with 24 to 48 hours between sessions.
Making life’s tasks lighter
The guidelines above are only one example out of many options, but they provide a framework that you can use to build your own program. However, I would highly recommend seeking out a professional in the field to give specific exercise programming advice that can be tailored to your own needs and goals as you age.
Following such a program would give your muscles an excellent stimulus to enhance strength, while also allowing enough recovery, a very important consideration as people age. You might think it looks like a huge time commitment, but an exercise routine like this can be done in less than an hour. This means that in less than three hours of strength training per week you can help improve your muscle health and reduce the risk of getting sarcopenia and associated health issues.
It’s also important to note that there is no one right way to do resistance training, and it needn’t involve traditional weight equipment. Group classes like Pilates and yoga or those that involve circuit training and work with resistance bands can all produce similar results. The key is to get out and exercise regularly, whatever that entails.
LAKEPORT, Calif. — Ahead of a grand opening event later this month, the Lakeport City Council this week is set to consider the official name for its new lakeside park.
The council will meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 17, in the council chambers at Lakeport City Hall, 225 Park St.
The council chambers will be open to the public for the meeting. Masks are highly encouraged where 6-foot distancing cannot be maintained.
If you cannot attend in person, and would like to speak on an agenda item, you can access the Zoom meeting remotely at this link or join by phone by calling toll-free 669-900-9128 or 346-248-7799.
The webinar ID is 973 6820 1787, access code is 477973; the audio pin will be shown after joining the webinar. Those phoning in without using the web link will be in “listen mode” only and will not be able to participate or comment.
Comments can be submitted by email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. To give the city clerk adequate time to print out comments for consideration at the meeting, please submit written comments before 3:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 17.
During Tuesday’s meeting, City Manager Kevin Ingram will ask the council to consider a resolution officially renaming the park at 800 and 810 N. Main St.
The proposed name is Xabatin — pronounced Ka-bah-ten — “Big Water” Community Park.
The seven-acre park is located on the site of the former Natural High School. It’s funded by a $5.9 million grant from the Proposition 68 State Parks and Water Bond.
Ingram’s report explained, “The park project was initially referred to as ‘Lakefront Park’ in the grant application, though this was a placeholder name employed to facilitate the grant application process. City staff never intended for this nondescript name to be the permanent designation for this vital community asset.”
Ingram said the city has worked with local tribes to select a name that pays tribute to the area’s Native American heritage.
The result is that the park will be called Xabatin, which translates to “Big Water,” the original Pomo name for Clear Lake, Ingram reported.
Also on Tuesday, Police Chief Brad Rasmussen will give an overview of the Lakeport town hall on homelessness and mental illness held on Sept. 27.
In other business, the council will present a proclamation designating October 2023 as Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and meet new Public Works employees AJ Adams, Jonathan Ocana and Nicolaj Murray, and Utilities Department employee Anthony Casanova.
Assistant City Manager Nick Walker will update the council on the challenges and opportunities related to the city’s fee program and Utilities Director Paul Harris will ask for the council’s approval of a purchase agreement for the procurement of a HOMA Sewer Pump - Model AMSS644-300.
On the consent agenda — items considered noncontroversial and usually accepted as a slate on one vote — are ordinances; minutes of the regular council meeting on Sept. 19; approval of Application 2023-024, with staff recommendations, for the 2023 Lakeport Elementary School Halloween Parade; and authorization for the mayor to sign the Second Amendment to the 2019 PEG agreement extending the term of the agreement through June 30, 2025.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
KELSEYVILLE, Calif. — A $4,920 grant from the Guy Fieri Foundation has allowed Kelseyville High School to expand its culinary arts program and increase students’ access to opportunities provided by the Family, Career and Community Leaders of America, a national career and technical student organization.
In 2022, the Guy Fieri Foundation awarded an initial grant to integrate the Family, Career and Community Leaders of America, or FCCLA, into the KHS Culinary Arts Program.
As culinary teacher Tami Cramer explained it, “FCCLA is to culinary arts as FFA is to agricultural sciences.”
FCCLA helps students develop real-world skills, explore career pathways, and become college- and career-ready through participation in competitive events, becoming involved in community service opportunities, student leadership, and attending leadership conferences, according to FCCLA’s website.
This year’s grant will make possible an additional capstone class and more entrepreneurial opportunities for students.
Grant funding will pay for another pizza oven, two carts, a 20-quart stand mixer, a stainless steel table, a dough sheeter, a speed rack and various cake decorating supplies.
Cramer explained that the new class may focus on advanced culinary skills such as cake decorating for weddings or advanced pastry-making.
“The idea is with these new skills and supplies, students will be able to use what they have learned to put on fundraisers to cover the costs of competition, including travel and lodging,” Cramer said. “Being able to offer a capstone class will give students the ability to expand into new areas, which will be really important if they choose to pursue a career in culinary arts.”
Kelseyville Unified School District Superintendent Dr. Nicki Thomas thanked Cramer for her dedication to supporting Kelseyville students and to the Guy Fieri Foundation for making the expanded learning opportunities possible.
The Guy Fieri Foundation is a nonprofit charity based in Petaluma with a mission to help local culinary arts programs in the middle schools, high schools, and community colleges. The Guy Fieri Foundation is committed to helping youth through nutrition education, exploring careers in hospitality, and encouraging goals for their future.
Using snapshots taken over 20 years with NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have learned important new details about an eruption from Eta Carinae witnessed on Earth in the mid-19th century.
Chandra data spanning decades has been combined into a new movie that contains frames of Eta Carinae from 1999, 2003, 2009, 2014, and 2020.
Astronomers used the Chandra observations, along with data from European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton, to watch as the stellar eruption from 180 years ago continues to expand into space at speeds up to 4.5 million miles per hour.
The new insights gleaned from Eta Carinae show how different space observatories can work together to help us understand changes in the universe that unfold on human timescales.
Eta Carinae is a system that contains two massive stars (one is about 90 times the mass of the Sun and the other is believed to be about 30 times the Sun’s mass). In the middle of the 19th century, Eta Carinae was observed to experience a huge explosion that astronomers have dubbed the “Great Eruption.”
During this event, Eta Carinae ejected between 10 and 45 times the mass of the Sun. This material became a dense pair of spherical clouds of gas, now called the Homunculus Nebula, on opposite sides of the two stars.
A bright ring of X-rays around the Homunculus Nebula was discovered about 50 years ago and studied in previous Chandra work.
The new movie from Chandra, plus a deep image generated by adding the data together, reveal important hints about Eta Carinae’s volatile history, including rapid expansion of the ring and a previously unknown faint shell of X-rays outside it.
“We’ve interpreted this faint X-ray shell as the blast wave from the Great Eruption in the 1840s,” said Michael Corcoran at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, who led the study. “It tells an important part of Eta Carinae’s backstory that we wouldn’t otherwise have known.”
Because the newly discovered outer X-ray shell has a similar shape and orientation to the Homunculus Nebula, Corcoran and his colleagues think both structures have a common origin.
The idea is that material was blasted away from Eta Carinae well before the 1843 Great Eruption — sometime between 1200 and 1800, based on the motion of clumps of gas previously seen in data from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope.
Later, the fast blast wave from the Great Eruption tore through space, colliding with and heating the clumps to millions of degrees to create the bright X-ray ring. The blast wave has now traveled beyond the bright ring.
“The shape of this faint X-ray shell is a plot twist in my mind,” said co-author Kenji Hamaguchi, a researcher at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and NASA Goddard. “It shows us that the faint shell, the Homunculus, and the bright inner ring likely all come from eruptions from the star system.”
With XMM-Newton, the researchers saw that the X-ray brightness of Eta Carinae has faded with time, agreeing with previous observations of the system obtained with NASA’s Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER) telescope on the International Space Station.
The authors applied a simple model to estimate how bright Eta Carinae was in X-rays at the time of the Great Eruption and combined this with the speed of the material — determined from the movie — to estimate how quickly the high-speed gas was ejected.
The researchers combined this information with an estimate of how much gas was ejected to determine that the Great Eruption likely consisted of two explosions. There was a first, quick ejection of a small amount of fast, low-density gas which produced the X-ray blast wave. This was followed by the slower ejection of dense gas that eventually formed the Homunculus Nebula.
A team led by Nathan Smith of the University of Arizona, one of the co-authors of the new X-ray study, has previously suggested that the Great Eruption was caused by the merger of two stars, in what was originally a triple system. This would also explain the ring-like structure seen in X-rays because it would cause material to be ejected in a flat plane.
“The story of Eta Carinae just keeps getting more interesting,” said Smith. “All evidence is suggesting that Eta Carinae survived a very powerful explosion that would normally obliterate a star. I can’t wait for the next episode of data to find out what other surprises Eta Carinae has in store for us.”
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center manages the Chandra program. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory's Chandra X-ray Center controls science operations from Cambridge, Massachusetts, and flight operations from Burlington, Massachusetts.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — This week, Lake County’s newly hired chief public defender will take his oath of office at the Board of Supervisors, who also will discuss protecting Clear Lake against invasive mussels.
The board will meet beginning at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Oct. 17, in the board chambers on the first floor of the Lake County Courthouse, 255 N. Forbes St., Lakeport.
The meeting ID is 937 4846 3305, pass code 978938. The meeting also can be accessed via one tap mobile at +16699006833,,93748463305#,,,,*978938#.
At 9:15 a.m., the board will host a ceremonial swearing-in of new Chief Public Defender Raymond Buenaventura.
Buenaventura, the mayor of Daly City, was hired last month to head up the creation of a new public defender’s office.
Also on Tuesday, at 10:15 a.m., the board will hear a presentation on the Clear Lake Integrated Preparedness and Resilience Plan for Dreissenid Mussel Management: A Rapid Response and Transition to Containment Plan.
The full agenda follows.
CONSENT AGENDA
5.1: Adopt proclamation recognizing the month of October as Head Start Awareness Month in Lake County.
5.2: Approve Amendment No. 2 to agreement between the county of Lake and Mountain G Engineering Inc. for consulting services for development of a Lake County Hazard Tree Removal Project in the amount of $42,000 and authorize the chair to sign.
5.3: Approve long distance travel retroactively for Supervisor E.J. Crandell to Denver, Colorado for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Farm Ranch and Rural Communities Advisory Committee meeting as an appointed member.
5.4: Adopt resolution approving an agreement with the state of California, Department of Food and Agriculture for State Organic Program Cooperative Agreement # 23-0093-000-SA in the amount of $4,565.00 for period July 1, 2023, through June 30, 2024.
5.5: Approve agreement between county of Lake and Mother-Wise for the Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program in the amount of $125,000 for fiscal years 2023-26 and authorize the board chair to sign.
5.6: Approve closure of Lake County Behavioral Health Services Department locations to the public to hold an all-staff training on Friday, Dec. 1, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
5.7: Adopt resolution authorizing the Lake County Behavioral Health Services director to sign the standard agreement and acknowledgement of grant terms and conditions for the California Providing Access and Transforming Health Justice-Involved Planning and Capacity Building Program Round Three and authorize the board chair to sign.
5.8: Approve continuation of proclamation declaring a Clear Lake Hitch emergency.
5.9: Approve continuation of proclamation of the existence of a local emergency due to pervasive tree mortality.
5.10: Approve continuation of an emergency declaration for drought conditions.
5.11: Approve continuation of proclamation of the existence of a local emergency due to low elevation snow and extreme cold.
5.12: Approve the continuation of the proclamation declaring a shelter crisis emergency due to the current need for sheltering for those experiencing homelessness during the weather and temperature patterns that the county of Lake has been experiencing.
5.13: Approve Board of Supervisors Meeting minutes from Aug. 22, Sept. 26 and Oct. 3, 2023.
5.14: Adopt resolution amending Resolution No. 2023-117 and the position allocation chart for fiscal year 2023-2024 establishing position allocation for fiscal year 2023-2024, Budget Unit 2201, Sheriff-Coroner and Budget Unit 2301, Sheriff-Jail Facilities and approving compensation adjustments for classifications in the deputy sheriff class series, public safety dispatcher class series and deputy sheriff-corrections class series.
5.15: Waive the formal bidding requirement and authorize the IT director to issue purchase order for three servers to Dell Marketing L.P.
5.16: Approve the agreement between the county of Lake and GSM Landscape Architects Inc. for professional design services for the Hammond Park Improvements Project, and authorize the chair to sign the agreement.
5.17: (a) Waive the formal bidding process, per Purchasing Code 38.1, as this is an annual contract for services that have not increased more than the consumer price index; and (b) approve agreement between the county of Lake and IC Solutions LLC for fiscal year 2023/24 with no change from the original contract and authorize the chairman to sign.
5.18: Approve Amendment between the county of Lake and Keefe Group for fiscal year 2023/24 with no change from the original and authorize the chairperson to sign.
5.19: Approve contract between county of Lake and Redwood Toxicology Laboratory Inc. for drug and alcohol testing, in the amount of $30,000 per fiscal year from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2026, and authorize the chair to sign.
TIMED ITEMS
6.2, 9:07 a.m.: Pet of the Week.
6.3, 9:10 a.m.: Presentation of proclamation recognizing the month of October as Head Start Awareness Month in Lake County.
6.4, 9:15 a.m.: Administer ceremonial oath of office to Chief Public Defender Raymond Buenaventura.
6.5, 10:15 a.m.: Presentation of the Clear Lake Integrated Preparedness and Resilience Plan for Dreissenid Mussel Management: A Rapid Response and Transition to Containment Plan.
UNTIMED ITEMS
7.2: Consideration of the following advisory board appointment: Food Policy Council.
CONSENT AGENDA
8.1: Public employee evaluation: County Counsel Lloyd Guintivano.
8.2: Conference with legal counsel: Existing litigation pursuant to Gov. Code sec. 54956.9 (d)(1) – FERC Project No. 77, Potter Valley Hydroelectric Project.
8.3: Conference with legal counsel: Existing litigation pursuant to Gov. Code section 54956.9(d)(1) - Center for Biological Diversity, et al. v. County of Lake, et al.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed a measure from Sen. Bill Dodd, D-Napa, to bolster California’s beverage container recycling program, reducing the amount of plastic and glass going into landfills and helping to stabilize the recycling market.
“This is a big step toward cutting our state’s waste stream while uplifting our recycling program,” Sen. Dodd said. “This new law reduces the amount of recyclables we put into landfills, provides a financial lifeline to recyclers, and maximizes consumers’ options for redeeming deposits on beverage containers. Ultimately, it will help us meet our recycling goals. I thank the governor for his support.”
The California Beverage Container Recycling and Litter Reduction Act, established in 1986, encourages consumers to recycle beverage containers by requiring them to pay a deposit for eligible bottles. Over the years, the program has been expanded to include soda, beer and wine bottles.
However, it does not include larger or vegetable juice containers. The program has been plagued with volatile annual scrap valuations that threaten many recyclers in rural, underserved communities.
“This measure will increase consumer opportunities to recycle and get cash back on empty containers, by making common sense updates to the CRV program, said Mark Murray, executive director of Californians Against Waste. “All juice beverages, regardless of container size, will now have a refund, and recycling payments for new and existing recycling centers will be stabilized against scrap market fluctuations.”
Sen. Dodd’s proposal, Senate Bill 353, will add containers of 100% fruit juice and vegetable juice to the state’s bottle recycling law, putting another 200 million containers per year into the recycling stream.
It would also invest new ongoing funding to support rural recycling options for consumers to redeem their deposit and improve recycling rates.
The bill also authorizes the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery to adjust its processing of payment calculations for recyclers to a quarterly schedule rather than yearly, helping to stabilize the market.
Lastly, the bill improves transparency on recycling metrics and allows the department to make critical efficiency improvements.
SB 353 follows the Legislature’s passage of a bill authored last year by Senate President pro Tem Toni Atkins and Sen. Dodd to add wine and spirits containers to the program and make significant investments in recycling. SB 353, won overwhelming legislative support before being signed by the governor.
“As the stewardship organization for plastic containers in California’s Bottle bill, we commend the senator expanding the bottle bill to include all juice bottles and to make the system more responsive to market forces,” said Sally Houghton, executive director of Plastic Recycling Corporation of California. “This will help get more containers recycled and turned back into bottles in a cost-effective manner.”
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The National Weather Service’s latest forecast is calling for a cool and cloudy weekend with the potential for rain, with a storm front set to arrive early in the new week with more rain expected before higher temperatures return.
Forecasters said mild showers were expected overnight and into Saturday morning, giving way to patchy fog in areas on the Northshore throughout the day on Saturday.
Because of the potential for cloud cover, forecasters said that the chances are not good for clear skies to see Saturday’s solar eclipse.
Conditions are forecast to be partly cloudy on Sunday, with chances of rain returning on Monday thanks to the arrival of a cold front.
Higher rainfall amounts are expected in the northern part of the region, with lesser amounts in Lake County.
The weather is predicted to be clear and sunny from Tuesday through Friday.
Temperatures from Saturday through Friday are forecast to range from the low 70s to high 80s during the day, and from the mid to high 50s at night.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
When wildfire smoke turns the air brown and hazy, you might think about heading indoors with the windows closed, running an air purifier or even wearing a mask. These are all good strategies to reduce exposure to the particles in wildfire smoke, but smoky air is also filled with potentially harmful gases. Those gases can get into buildings and remain in the walls and floors for weeks.
Getting rid of these gases isn’t as simple as turning on an air purifier or opening a window on a clear day.
In a new study published in the journal Science Advances, colleagues and I tracked the life of these gases in a home exposed to wildfire smoke. We also found that the best way to get rid of the risk is among the simplest: start cleaning.
The challenge of smoke particles and gases
In December 2021, several of my friends and colleagues were affected by the Marshall Fire that burned about 1,000 homes in Boulder County, Colorado. The “lucky” ones, whose homes were still standing, asked me what they should do to clean their houses. I am an atmospheric and indoor chemist, so I started looking into the published research, but I found very few studies on what happens after a building is exposed to smoke.
What scientists did know was that smoke particles end up on indoor surfaces – floors, walls, ceilings. We knew that air filters could remove particles from the air. And colleagues and I were just beginning to understand that volatile organic compounds, which are traditionally thought to stay in the air, could actually stick to surfaces inside a home and build up reservoirs – invisible pools of organic molecules that can contribute to the air chemistry inside the house.
Volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, are compounds that easily become gases at room temperature. They include everything from limonene in lemons to benzene in gasoline. VOCs aren’t always hazardous to human health, but many VOCs in smoke are. I started to wonder whether the VOCs in wildfire smoke could also stick to the surfaces of a house.
Tracking lingering risks in a test house
I worked with researchers from across the U.S. and Canada to explore this problem during the Chemical Assessment of Surfaces and Air, or CASA, study in 2022. We built on HOMEChem, a previous study in which we looked at how cooking, cleaning and occupancy could change indoor air.
In CASA, we studied what happens when pollutants and chemicals get inside our homes – pesticides, smog and even wood smoke.
Using a cocktail smoker and wood chips, we created a surprisingly chemically accurate proxy for wildfire smoke and released small doses into a test house built by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. NIST’s house allowed us to conduct controlled chemistry experiments in a real-world setting.
We even aged the smoke in a large bag with ozone to simulate what happens when smoke travels long distances, like the smoke from Canadian wildfires that moved into the U.S. in the summer of 2023. Smoke chemistry changes as it travels: Particles become more oxidized and brown, while VOCs break down and the smoke loses its distinctive smell.
How VOCs behave in your home
What we found in CASA was intriguing. While smoke particles quickly settled on indoor surfaces, VOCs were more insidious.
At first, the house took up these smoke VOCs – on floors, walls and building surfaces. But once the initial smoke cleared, the house would slowly release those VOCs back out over the next hours, days or even months, depending on the type of VOC.
This release is what we call a partitioning process: During the smoke event, individual VOC molecules in the air attach to indoor surfaces with weak chemical bonds. The process is called adsorption. As smoke clears and the air cleans out, the bonds can break, and molecules “desorb” back out into the air.
We could watch this partitioning happen in the air by measuring smoke VOC concentrations. On surfaces, we could measure the weight of smoke VOCs that deposited on very sensitive balances and then were slowly released.
Overall, we concluded that this surface reservoir allows smoke VOCs to linger indoors, meaning that people are exposed to them not just during the major smoke event but also long after.
While smoke VOC concentrations in our test house decreased with time, they remained persistently elevated above normal levels.
Given that VOC concentrations from other sources, such as cooking and cleaning, can already be high enough in homes to harm health, this additional long-term exposure source from smoke could be important. Further toxicology studies will be needed to determine the significance of its health effects.
How to clean up when smoke gets in
So, what can you do to remove these lingering smoke gases?
We found that air purifiers can remove only some of the VOCs that are in the air – they can’t clean the VOCs on your floors or in your walls. They also work only when they’re running, and even then, air purifiers don’t work particularly well to reduce VOCs.
Opening windows to ventilate will clean the air, if it isn’t smoggy or smoky outside. But as soon as we closed windows and doors, smoke VOCs started to bleed off the surface reservoirs and into the air again, resulting in an elevated, near-constant concentration.
We realized that to permanently remove those smoke VOCs, we had to physically remove them from surfaces.
The good news is that cleaning surfaces by vacuuming, dusting and mopping with a commercial, nonbleach solution did the trick. While some remediation companies may do this surface cleaning for you after extreme exposures, surface cleaning after any smoke event – like Canadian wildfire smoke drifting into homes in 2023 – should effectively and permanently reduced smoke VOC levels indoors.
Of course, we could reach only a certain number of surfaces – it’s hard to vacuum the ceiling! That meant that surface cleaning improved but didn’t eliminate smoke VOC levels in the house. But our study at least provides a path forward for cleaning indoor spaces affected by air pollutants, whether from wildfires, chemical spills or other events.
With wildfires becoming more frequent, surface cleaning can be an easy, cheap and effective way to improve indoor air quality.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Lake County Animal Care and Control has many new dogs waiting to meet their new families this week.
Dogs available for adoption this week include mixes of boxer, Chihuahua, collie, dachshund, German shepherd, hound, Labrador retriever pit bull, Rhodesian ridgeback, Siberian husky, shepherd and treeing walker coonhound.
Dogs that are adopted from Lake County Animal Care and Control are either neutered or spayed, microchipped and, if old enough, given a rabies shot and county license before being released to their new owner. License fees do not apply to residents of the cities of Lakeport or Clearlake.
This week’s dogs include a 2-year-old male German shepherd with a black and tan coat. He’s in kennel No. 3, ID No. LCAC-A-5979.
The shelter also has a 5-month-old male Rhodesian ridgeback puppy with a tricolor coat. He is in kennel No. 17, ID No. LCAC-A-6098.
Another adoptable dog is a 1-year-old male Chihuahua-dachshund mix with a black brindle coat. He is in kennel No. 4, ID No. LCAC-A-5992.
Those dogs and the others shown on this page at the Lake County Animal Care and Control shelter have been cleared for adoption.
Call Lake County Animal Care and Control at 707-263-0278 or visit the shelter online for information on visiting or adopting.
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
As cold and flu season ramps up, health care experts are once again on high alert for the possibility of a tripledemic, or a surge brought on by the respiratory viruses that cause COVID-19, the flu and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV. The good news is that this year, health officials have more tools at their disposal to combat them.
RSV, COVID-19 and the flu are all contagious respiratory illnesses that have similar symptoms, making it difficult to distinguish between the three viral infections without a lab test. Testing is the only way to know which virus is causing your symptoms. In fact, researchers are working to create one test that can detect COVID-19, RSV and the flu.
As a nursing professor with experience in public health promotion, I am often asked about the differences between these respiratory viruses. This year, I am fielding many questions about the timing of getting the new COVID-19 and RSV vaccines along with the flu shot, and whether they can be given together.
What to know about the symptoms
Symptoms of COVID-19, RSV and the flu can range from mild – or even no noticeable symptoms at all – to severe. Flu symptoms typically come on suddenly, while RSV and COVID-19 often start out mild but can become severe over time. In addition, while a flu infection does not typically affect one’s ability to taste or smell, the loss of taste or smell can be a common COVID-19 symptom.
All three infections can cause fevers and fatigue, while chills and body aches are more common with COVID-19 and the flu. More severe symptoms of these infections include difficulty breathing and subsequent infections like pneumonia.
Timing the shots
With the new RSV vaccine and updated COVID-19 vaccine now available and flu season just around the corner, a natural question is whether there is an optimal schedule for the three shots.
The answer to that question is, if you are eligible, to get these vaccines as soon as possible. It is important to consider that it takes approximately two weeks after vaccination for your body to develop antibodies from both the COVID-19 vaccines and the flu vaccine.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that anyone who is either unvaccinated or has previously received a COVID-19 vaccine before Sept. 12, 2023, to get the updated vaccine. This means now is the time to get the updated COVID-19 vaccine that targets a previously dominant variant of the omicron family.
While everyone 6 months of age and older is advised to receive both the COVID-19 and flu vaccines, certain populations have a higher risk for severe infection, such as pregnant women, and should be extra vigilant about getting vaccinated.
In addition, among those vaccinated against COVID-19, symptoms during an infection tend to be milder. However, due in part to the quickly evolving nature of the virus, it has become clear that immune protection from COVID-19 vaccination or infection diminishes over time. While studies show that the primary COVID-19 series maintains efficacy against severe disease and death six months after vaccination, protection after vaccination decreases over time. Viruses, such as those that cause COVID-19 and influenza, also continuously mutate and evolve.
The fact that COVID-19 vaccine immunity decreases over time and that viruses evolve are exactly why updated vaccines are so critical. Without a large uptake of updated vaccines in the population, COVID-19 infection rates could surge again.
But if you miss that deadline, it is absolutely better to get vaccinated later in the season than not at all. Flu, COVID-19 and RSV vaccines are available at your health care provider’s office, your local health department and most retail pharmacies, although access to the newly updated COVID-19 vaccine is still limited in some areas of the country.
A difficult respiratory virus season ahead
While infections and hospitalizations from COVID-19 declined dramatically in 2023, experts are remaining vigilant against the possibility of new, more-infectious variants causing another fall and winter surge. Adults 65 and older continue to be the highest-risk group for severe infection.
To further compound this, flu vaccine rates have been lower during the pandemic, suggesting that Americans may be out of the habit of getting their annual flu shot.
Shots can be given together
Many are also wondering whether they can or should get the updated COVID-19 booster, the new RSV vaccine and the flu shot at the same time. The good news is, the CDC clearly indicates that it is safe for both adults and children who are eligible for the updated COVID-19 vaccine to get this vaccine simultaneously with the annual flu shot.
A 2022 study found that common vaccine side effects, such as pain at the injection site, occurred at slightly higher rates when someone received the flu vaccine and a COVID-19 vaccine at the same time, as opposed to receiving only a COVID-19 booster. However, those reactions, including fatigue and headache, were mild and resolved within a day or two. In addition, a recent study found that the immune response was the same when both vaccines were given together compared to when given separately.
Getting the COVID-19, RSV and flu vaccines isn’t just about your own health – it’s about family and community health too. Communities with higher vaccination rates have fewer opportunities to spread the virus.
Keep in mind that many people cannot be vaccinated, because they have weakened immune systems or are undergoing treatments. They depend on those around them for protection. While one person may experience mild symptoms if they contract RSV, COVID-19 or the flu, they could spread the virus to others who could become severely ill.
Because it’s impossible to predict how people will react if they get sick, getting the flu and COVID-19 vaccines – and the RSV vaccine if you are eligible – is the best prevention strategy.
This is an updated version of an article that was originally published on Sept. 22, 2022.