Even though traffic was virtually nonexistent in the metropolitan area of Guadalajara on December 25, the air quality dipped dramatically, mostly provoked by dozens of fires set by celebrants on Christmas Eve, especially in the southern part of the city.
An air quality reading of 162 Imecas (very bad) registered at Las Pintas monitoring station wasn’t helped by a fire at a plastics factory in the Alamo industrial zone. Civil Protection officials report extinguishing around 50 bonfires on the night of December 24, and confiscating 12 kilograms of fireworks, mostly luces de bengala (hand-held flares).
Jalisco Civil Protection Director Jose Trinidad Lopez Rivas has urged Tapatios to refrain from lighting fires, setting off fireworks and launching candle-powered hot-air balloons (globos de cantoya) on December 31, to avoid a similar scenario to Christmas Eve.