Orange Dawn in Sydney

Woke this morning to quite an eerie sight - Sydney is blanketed by an orange sky! Still bleary-eyed, I grabbed the camera and went outside to capture the strange dawn.







Unfortunately, my photos aren't doing justice to the true colour of the sky and air. Think very orange. These photos were taken at 6.30am; Tony said it was a darker red at 5.30am. I woke up the kids earlier than usual so they could also see, and they jumped up quite quickly when I said they should come outside and see the orange sky. After first seeing it through her skylight, Sarah thought it was some kind of eclipse, and Daniel could only say, wow! Outside cars are all covered with dirty dust, and will definitely need a wash.

The phenomenon is being caused by a good old-fashioned dust storm, and I can smell it, too. Unseasonably warm temperatures and gale force winds have been the contributing factor, resulting in the Bureau of Meteorology issuing a severe weather warning for damaging winds in Sydney with a gale warning issued for Sydney closed waters.

So no, it's not Armaggedon ... nor are the Martians landing, which were apparently some Twitter comments, lol. Other news.com.au comments have been: It's Mad Max from Beyond Thunderdome .. it's radioactive dust from Maralinga...greenhouse gasses have turned orange... lol lol lol! Although a news report I read said that Broken Hill did go "darker than night" at 3.30pm yesterday afternoon - now that does sound rather Biblical! As does another news commentor who said "Earthquakes in Victoria. Orange blanket haze in Sydney. Fires in Queensland. Just waiting for the Four Horsemen now"

Oh my!


AFTERNOON NEWS UPDATE: The red dust covering Sydney was swept up and carried east by gale-force winds from further inland, where years of drought have left the earth dry.

Sydneysiders with allergies and respiratory problems are being told to stay inside.
The NSW Department of Education said it would ask school principals to keep students indoors today, cancel any planned physical education activities and to keep a special eye on students with asthma or other respiratory conditions.

Bureau of Meteorology NSW regional director Barry Hanstrum said:
An event like this is extremely rare, It's one of the worst, if not the worst.


I wish Tony had stayed home :(

NEXT MORNING UPDATE:
Tony came home smiling, as per usual, and seem unconcerned about being outdoors in the dust all day! He had a job to do and a dust storm was simply another weather condition that he worked through. I have to credit his diligence!

More details have emerged re this dust storm, which is tragic for the drought-stricken farmers out west, who have now lost all their topsoil.

News reports are that we endured the biggest dust storm for 70 years, which measured seven times that of a "severe" dust storm. About five million tonnes of soil swept across southeast Queensland and NSW. Griffith University dust expert (didn't know there were 'dust experts) Craig Strong said a combination of strong winds and dry conditions caused the 800km long storm front.

The red dust broke records for air pollution, with air particle concentration levels reaching 15,400 micrograms per cubic metre of air at one location. A normal day would see up to 20 micrograms and a bushfire might generate 500 micrograms.

CSIRO scientist Ross Mitchell said a monitoring station at Birdsville measured dust in inverse mega metres, with a 1000 reading constituting a severe storm. "When the front came through about 2pm local time, we got a reading of 7200 which is seven times greater than what is already a pretty significant dust event."

That's a lot of dust! Now to the cleaning...