A northern Chinese city was shrouded in smog Monday, forcing suspension of classes at most schools, airport closure and traffic complications during the first day of the heavy smog season.
Smog levels in Harbin, a large city in the northern Chinese province of Heilongjiang, reached dangerously high levels on the particulate matter index. Any number above 300 is considered hazardous, and the World Health Organizations suggests daily exposure to levels that don't pass 20, Reuters reported - in some parts of Harbin, experts read levels of 1,000 and up. Some of the 11 million citizens living in the city experienced visibility diminished to the length of a football field, the Associated Press reported.
All primary and middle school suspended their classes, while the local airport and some public bus routes temporarily stopped their scheduled work, state-run news agency Xinhua reported. American jazz singer Patti Austen, who was to perform in Beijing this week, canceled her concert due to an asthma attack that was reportedly as a direct result of the choking pollution that had settled in the Chinese atmosphere. Some blamed the smog emergency on the first day that city heating was turned on for winter.
"I couldn't see anything outside the window of my apartment, and I thought it was snowing," 33-year-old housewife and mother of a young boy Wu Kai told the Associated Press. "Then I realized it wasn't snow. I have not seen the sun for a long time."
She added that her husband left the house wearing a face mask, and that he could see but a few meters in front of him. Other reports indicated that visibility was less than 50 meters.
"It's scary, too dangerous. How could people drive or walk on such a day?" she stated.
The Chinese government has attempted to attack the pollution issue, which plagues most major cities in the country. Following public outcry against health and societal issues that were linked to the immense smog, the Republic started investing in some anti-pollution initiatives, including moves to shrink coal use in the country to below 65 percent of total energy usage over the next four years.
On Chinese Twitter-like microblogging site Weibo, some users expressed their frustration with scathing commentary and sour sarcasm.
"After years of effort, the wise and hard-working people of Harbin have finally managed to skip both the middle-class society and the communist society stages, and have now entered a fairyland society!" one user posted.
