Purple Haze
Posted by BC on June 30th, 2008
No, I’m not thinking about Jimmi Hendrix. Well, maybe a little, especially when California is covered with so much smoke from the wild fires that it is turning the Sun purple.
The 1 micron-sized ash particles that are floating in the atmosphere along the west coastal region of the U.S.A. scatter the red light and allow more blue light through. The combined effect is to make white light appear with a purple hue. The smoke has caused such a thick layer in the air that people are ordered to stay inside as much as possible. The thick pollution also makes observing the Sun without proper filters easy. (IT IS NOT RECOMMENDED TO LOOK DIRECTLY AT THE SUN WITHOUT PROPER FILTERS.) More information can be found at spaceweather.com.
