WAWA 3

In the summer of 2023, smoke from the largest concentration of recorded Canadian wildfires turned Northeast city skies orange, which created dystopian and ominous looking scenes. A harbinger of things to come due to global warming. This atmospheric effect is called Rayleigh scattering. The scientific reason behind this effect is straightforward: on Earth, we have air, and some light from the sun bounces off the molecules of air in the atmosphere. The higher-energy colors with shorter wavelengths — that is, blue light — scatter more readily, and as a result, the entire sky is suffused in blue. Smoke particles also scatter light, and because they are larger than air molecules, they also scatter the orange and red colors. That results in far more red and orange in the sky than we are used to seeing during the daytime, imparting a surreal hue. At the time, governments told citizens to reduce outdoor activity, and to stay indoors due to the toxic air quality. Unfortunately, wildlife had no such luxury.