Wildfire smoke will drift into Oregon and Washington overnight Tuesday

SEATTLE - Smoke from wildfires burning in Northern California is making its way to Oregon and Washington - again. 

As of Tuesday morning, the cloud of smoke was moving up the Oregon coast. It could reach the Washington coast by Tuesday evening and move inland overnight.

It's not clear yet whether it will drift down to surface levels of the atmosphere, but if it does, forecasters don't believe it will be as severe as the smoke we saw a couple of weeks ago. 

Q13 Meteorologist MJ McDermott is cautiously optmistic that our air quality will remain good. 

The smoke will linger over Washington on Wednesday, and by Thursday, a marine push should start to send the smoke east toward Idaho and Montana. The smoke is expected to be completely cleared by Thursday night. 

The smoke that will linger over Washington stems from nearly 30 wildfires burning around California. The National Weather Service warned that hot, dry conditions with strong Santa Ana winds could continue posing a fire danger in Southern California through Tuesday afternoon.

More than 110 buildings have burned, including homes and winery installations. 

The fire in wine country pushed through brush that had not burned for a century, even though surrounding areas were incinerated in a series of blazes in recent years.

In a forested far northern part of the state, more than 1,200 people were evacuated in Shasta County for the Zogg Fire.

Three people have died in the fire, Shasta County Sheriff Eric Magrini said Monday. He gave no details but urged people who receive evacuation orders: “Do not wait.”

So far in this year’s historic fire season, more than 8,100 California wildfires have killed 29 people, scorched 5,780 square miles (14,970 square kilometers) and destroyed more than 7,000 buildings.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.