Wednesday evening sunset seemed unusually red in Ohio, could this be related to the California wild fires?

Question

Maybe the smoke is getting into the upper atmosphere and reaching Northern Ohio. Volcanoes can do this.

I still think my theory is sound, though I don't know how likely it is. I also saw that the smoke plumes were blowing west out over the Pacific. I thought that if enough smoke and heat uplift were created, it would bring this material high enough to enter the high speed Jet Stream which generally flows to the west. When Krakatoa in Indonesia erupted in 1883 it created vivid red skies in Europe.

Answer 1

It is unlikely at this point. The high pressure system that has been responsible for the Santa Ana winds have been blowing the smoke from the fires westward out into the Pacific until they switched back Wednesday but the smoke is still isolated in the southwest area yet.

Also, the upper level flow has the southern half of the U.S. basically cut off from the northern half right now with a northwest
flow at surface in your area. The air trajectories indicate that the air currently in Ohio is from southern Canada at the moment.

There has not been enough time for the smoke to have mixed around the world and that would only happen if it was raised to great heights, which I am sure some has but not to great quantities such as with a volcanic eruption.

If the low level flow off the fires had a different direction towards the Midwest, yes, it is possible. During the fires of 1973, you could actually smell the smoke in the air even though I was in western Texas and nearly 1000 miles away.

Answer 2

If it was smoke, this maybe the most likely source. According the the agency that keeps track of smoke and other things that may be caught up in the atmosphere, this was copied from a section of there text report for last Thursday...

"Ontario: Several large fires that are spread across southern Ontario are producing moderately dense to dense plumes of smoke that are moving to the north or to the northeast. These range from the southwest border of Ontarior to the southeast border."

There entire text report can be found at this link:

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/PS/FIRE/DATA/SMOKE/2007J260213.html

You can also track the smoke and look for "hot spots" too with their web interactive satellite fire and smoke plume detection viewer program at this link.

http://www.firedetect.noaa.gov/viewer.htm

Old text written reports can be found at:

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/PS/FIRE/smoke.html

Answer 3

I don't know..I live in NE Ohio and it was RED again tonight. How come is the question?

Answer 4

no nothing to do with the fires. one reason the smoke is blowng west into the pacfic ocean.

Answer 5

Are you kidding? Its not. We had another red sunset here in New York and its def not related. I know that they say there are no stupid questions....but....

Answer 6

doubt it.......ohio...california....pretty far away...