It was the height of the Covid era. A mix between Zoom and Google Classroom. On the morning of September 9th, 2020, I remember waking up to the orange glow shining ominously beneath my curtains. Being the curious 14 year old, I had though I had woken up on Mars. The unfamiliar orange sky's was a common sight on the red planet. Although it turned out that I was actually still on earth, it was the wildfire smoke that had covered most of the Bay Area, blocking sunlight and letting only red and orange wavelengths through.
I vividly remembered going into my backyard and touching the chairs that were now covered in a thin layer of ash. The air smelled rough which kind of reminded me of a failed attempt at a barbeque. Although class was already online and already quite hectic from the Coronavirus, my classes became even more crazy with the addition of these wildfires. I remember the day before the skies turned orange, I was out on the golf course practicing with my mom. The wildfires had already created a poor air quality for most of California. Although it was only advised that older generations shouldn't go outside, it was pretty hard to breathe in general. You could taste the burnt trees in every breathe you took. Even a tight sealed N-95 mask wasn't enough to clear out the taste of ash in your mouth. Not only was the skies scary to look at, they were incredibly dangerous to breathe in as well.
The strange color comes from the particles of smoke that are released from the wildfires. The skies gets its orange color from the smoke particles scattering sunlight. This phenomenon filters out shorter, blue wavelengths of light and allows the longer, red and orange wavelengths pass through (NOAA). I remember seeing on the weather app that the air quality had hit some pretty scary levels which essentially forced everyone to be inside (being that it was covid season, everyone was already inside anyways). For California, 2020 was a record breaking year for wildfires. It broke records for being the most devastating wild fire season ever. The August Complex fire broke state records for the largest wildfire in history burning over 1 million acres. In all of 2020, 4.3 million acres would be burned setting a new state record (Cal Fire). The record breaking fire season was due to a combination of record-breaking lightning strikes, dry conditions accelerated by climate change, and strong winds.
The orange skies of 2020 were unforgettable. They serve as a constant reminder for everyone that if climate change isn't addressed, the rare orange skies will become more and more common over the years. Although the orange sky didn't mark the end of the world, it shows what our future could look like if we didn't take climate change seriously.
References:
https://www.today.com/news/why-sky-orange-wildfires-smoke-rcna91577
https://cpo.noaa.gov/fire-and-smoke-at-the-wildland-urban-interface/
https://www.fire.ca.gov/incidents/2020
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