Smoke from Canadian forest fires drifts over Finland, which makes the sunsets turn red. The best time to watch the red sky is on Tuesday evening.
In the coming evenings, you can see a particularly red glowing sunset, when the smoke from the Canadian forest fires drifts over Finland.
The smoke rises high into the atmosphere and is carried by the winds. It does not cause health or odor problems.
The redness of the sunset is caused by smoke particles in the air scattering the sun’s rays. First, the short wavelengths of light scatter, so that mostly the long, red wavelengths reach the eyes.
The meteorologist of Matti Huutonen estimates that the clearest red sky can be seen today, Tuesday evening, because the weather is clear in a large part of Finland. A more uniform cloud cover may arrive in the north.
From Wednesday onwards, the weather will become cloudy, when a low pressure with rain areas arrives over Finland from the west.
It is not at all unusual for wildfire smoke to travel up to 6,000 kilometers from Canada to Finland. The phenomenon has been seen before, for example, in summer 2023 and summer 2018.
Wildfires are raging in Canada
Canada has been suffering from continuous wildfires for months. Tens of thousands of people have had to be evacuated, especially in the western parts of the country.
Monitoring wildfires According to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Center (CIFFC). nearly five million hectares of land have burned during this year.
Last year was the worst in Canadian history for wildfires. According to research institute The Canadian Climate Institute climate change increases wildfires and makes them bigger and hotter than before.