Large numbers of New Yorkers woke up to the smell of smoke on Monday, the result of a brush fire in Wharton State Forest in New Jersey.
New York City’s official emergency notification system sent out an alert on Twitter about the issue at 12:42 a.m. Monday.
Due to a brush fire in the Wharton State Park in New Jersey, residents in Staten Island & Brooklyn may smell smoke.
— NYC OEM – Notify NYC (@NotifyNYC) April 7, 2014
According to The New York Times, the state forest is about 90 miles south of the city, and the smoke from the fire was trapped “in a weather system that kept it from dispersing into the atmosphere.”
Tim Morrin, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service, told the newspaper the smell should be gone by the afternoon. The fire, which occurred in a remote area of the state park, had spread through 1,500 acres by Monday morning, and was 50 percent contained. The cause of the blaze was not yet clear to officials.