Eerie red sky filmed as wildfires scorch Canada, forcing mass evacuations
Hundreds of wildfires scorching the Northwest Territories province of Canada have forced the complete evacuation of the capital city Yellowknife, which makes up about half of the province's population -- or 20,000 people -- this week.
Not only did the fires prompt emergency declarations, including a territory-wide state of emergency, but the wildfire smoke also created poor air quality and a dramatic appearance of the sky that one onlooker described as looking like nighttime during the day.
"So this isn't any photo magic," Dana Fergusson said as she recorded a video of the eerie orange-red appearance near the town of Fort Smith in the Northwest Territories on Sunday, Aug. 13. Fort Smith is a several-hour drive southeast of Yellowknife, sitting near the border of the Northwest Territories and Alberta. "This looks like nighttime in the day in front of the town hall. Wow, like, super duper orange. It looks like nighttime."
The sky can appear red or orange when wildfire smoke is present due to how the sun's light, or wavelengths, are scattered in the atmosphere. Sunlight contains all the colors of the rainbow. As the sunlight passes through the Earth's atmosphere, particles and molecules in the air reflect specific wavelengths. The wavelengths that aren't reflected are the colors visible in the sky. On a clear weather day, shorter wavelengths like green, blue and purple aren't reflected, which makes the sky appear blue during the day. When there are smoke particles in the sky, those shorter wavelengths are reflected, but longer wavelengths, such as red, orange and yellow, are not. Because of that, wildfire smoke can make the sky look orange or red.
As wildfire smoke from fires burning in Quebec poured into the United States earlier in the summer, a similar thick orange haze engulfed the New York City skyline.
Smoke has been present at times across Canada and northern parts of the U.S. as Canada is in the midst of its worst wildfire season on record, with a total of nearly 34 million charred acres of land as of Aug. 16, according to data from the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre (CIFFC).
Evacuees described harrowing accounts as flames and smoke created treacherous conditions while fleeing Yellowknife.
"There were patches of flames on each side as we drove through," Nadia Byrne told CNN of her evacuation Tuesday evening. She noted that the drive was the most terrifying experience she's ever had.
"We hit a patch where we couldn't see any of the lines on the road. That lasted 45 minutes," she went on to tell CNN. "We had our N95s on and could barely breathe, and our chest and lungs hurt."
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According to Plume Labs, very unhealthy and dangerous air quality persisted across much of the central and southern part of the Northwest Territories on Thursday due to the wildfire smoke. Poor air quality conditions stretched into the Upper Midwest as smoky conditions streamed into the region.
Parts of British Columbia, Alberta, and neighboring parts of the northwestern United States were also experiencing unhealthy and very unhealthy air quality levels due to numerous fires burning across western Canada.
AccuWeather has detailed information on air quality levels and a smoke map that users can reference before heading outside. Experts recommend wearing an N95 mask and taking other precautions when wildfire smoke creates unhealthy air quality conditions.
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