2 . Schools across the US East Coast canceled outdoor activities, commercial airline traffic was slowed and millions of Americans were urged to stay indoors on Wednesday as smoke from Canadian wildfires drifted south, blanketing cities in thick and yellow smoke.

“It’s critical that Americans experiencing dangerous air pollution, especially those with health conditions, listen to local authorities to protect themselves and their families,” US President Joe Biden said.

New York’s world-famous skyline, usually visible for miles, disappeared because of the smoke, which some residents said made them feel unwell.

“It makes breathing difficult,” Mohammed Abass said as he walked down Broadway in Manhattan. “I’ve been scheduled for a road test for driving, for my driving license today, and it was canceled.”

“It looks like Mars out there,” said Fox Forecast Center meteorologist Brian Mastro just before 2 p.m.

New York Goveror Kathy Hochul called the situation an “emergency crisis,” noting that the air pollution index for parts of her state were eight times above normal.

In Bethesda, Maryland, a high school moved its graduation ceremony indoors, while a Brooklyn, New York, elementary school deferred its “Spring Fling” dance party. A school in Montelair, New Jersey, called off a fifth-grade trip to an amusement park.

The smoke was wafting (飘荡) over the US northern border from Canada, where hundreds of forest fires have burnt 9. 4 million acres and forced 120,000 people from their homes in an unusually early and intense start to Canada’s wildfire season.

Tyrone Sylvester, 66, playing chess outside in Manhattan’s Union Square us he has on most days for 30 years, but wearing a mask, said he had never seen the city’s air quality so bad. “When the sun looks like that,” he said, pointing at the smoky sky, “we know something’s wrong. This is what global warming looks like.”

Poor air quality is likely to continue into the weekend, with a developing storm system expected to shift the smoke westward across the Great Lakes and deeper south through the Ohio Valley and into the mid-Atlantic region, AccuWeather said.

I had always enjoyed living in my flat on the top floor of a Victorian building in Wimbledon. Being so high up made me feel safe and secure, and I enjoyed wonderful views across the tree tops. I had never expected that I would experience a fire in the flat.

One night I went to sleep as usual after setting my alarm clock for 7 am and switching off the bedside light. A few hours later, I woke up puzzled. I could smell smoke and I could see that the bedroom was extremely dark. Then I realized the room was so dark because it was filled with smoke. I immediately left my bed and stood by the door. I was in panic. I was also convinced that I had somehow caused the fire without knowing it. I thought, “What will my neighbors think? I must get rid of the smoke before it gets into their flats.”

I managed to make my way to the curtains and tried to draw them open. This simple everyday act proved quite beyond me. When I finally opened the window, I saw all my neighbors standing on the lawn below, tightly wrapped up in their dressing gowns against the December cold. Then I realized it wasn’t me that had caused the fire. It was someone else.

Even though I had taken many fire awareness courses at work, I forgot everything I’d ever been taught at that time. My one instinct was to flee down the stairs.

“There’s a fire! Stay by the window!” someone shouted below the building. And that man’s words of warning stopped me and helped save my life. If I had opened my front door at the top of the stairwell to escape, the flames raging below would have been drawn upwards by the rush of oxygen and would have swept over me in an instant. I knew I should go to the kitchen and wait for help by the window there. I knew the firemen would save me using a ladder.

So I went to the kitchen.

Finally, the firemen arrived.

On Wednesday afternoon, two days after the crash of Flight MU5735, it was raining in Molang, a village near the scene of the disaster in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region. Some relatives of the passengers who were on board the Boeing 737-800 burst     1     tears as rescuers and excavators (挖掘机) were working in a place — a mountainous area     2     their loved ones could lie    3    (bury). They left white and yellow chrysanthemums (菊花) — a flower that Chinese traditionally use to pay tribute (敬意) to    4     dead.

The plane, operated by China Eastern Airlines, left Kunming, capital of Yunnan province, at 1:11 pm on Monday for Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province. Air traffic     5    (controller) lost track of the jet, which was carrying 123 passengers and nine crew members, over Wuzhou. The plane crashed at about 2:30 p.m., Xinhua News Agency reported.

The first rescue team, from Tengxian county, Wuzhou,     6    (arrive) at the crash site at 3:50 p.m. on Monday. As the road into the village is extremely narrow, it is not    7    (convenience) for large vehicles to enter the area. The report said villagers had helped bring in rescue materials on their motorcycles, which to some extent had eased transportation difficulties. By 7 p.m. on Wednesday, rescuers had searched an area covering 46,000 square meters, but failed to find a    8    (survive).

One of the aircraft’s two black boxes found on Wednesday, believed    9    (be) the cockpit (驾驶舱) voice recorder, was sent to Beijing, according to Zhu Tao. He said the exterior of the black box was     10    (severe) damaged, but its data storage unit survived.