Thread by @SFGate

If you woke up this morning and thought you were on Mars instead of the Bay Area, you’re definitely not alone. 

Smoke from the #CaliforniaFires has cast an orange glow over #SanFrancisco and the #EastBay.

So, what’s going on?

According to @ggweather meteorologist Jan Null, winds are pushing smoke from the north, where multiple wildfires are raging, to the south and into the Bay Area.

sfgate.com/news/editorspi…

Here’s some satellite footage of what the smoke looks like over the West Coast:

https://twitter.com/CIRA_CSU/status/1303372777458552832

In some spots, the sooty air has even reached the ground, with reports of ash falling at the Buchanan Field Airport in Concord.

However, @AIRNow showed that the air quality in the Bay Area was only moderate as of 9AM.

According to @NWS forecaster Roger Gass, the smoke is getting lifted high into the atmosphere, since the fires are farther away.

The polluted air is currently hovering above a marine layer that pushed inland from the Pacific Ocean overnight.

sfgate.com/news/editorspi…

It’s hard to pin down the air quality forecast on Wednesday, but with the northerly winds aloft expected to lighten, gravity could take over as the primary vertical transport of the smoke.

https://twitter.com/NWSBayArea/status/1303720348605538305

In the afternoon, a strong onshore wind is expected to pick up and this could blow the smoke east, from the coast into the East Bay and Central Valley.

Read more from @bayareamoms: sfgate.com/news/editorspi…

.@zimpix curated some striking reader-submitted photos of the orange sky around the Bay Area here: sfgate.com/news/editorspi…

Maybe you’ve been trying (and failing) to accurately capture the orange sky on your phone.

@bayareamoms explains why your pics are looking especially washed-out: sfgate.com/news/editorspi…

.@Dannosphere writes about how the orange skies are reminding everyone on Twitter of a certain Ryan Gosling sci-fi sequel: sfgate.com/movies/article…