From the Summit
When Wildfire Smoke Turned Our Skies Orange
Smoke from Canadian wildfires drifted into New England in mid-July, dimming the sun to a red ember and erasing the Boston skyline from view — right from our summit vantage point.
On the morning of July 15, smoke transported south from wildfires burning in Canada settled over Great Blue Hill, thickening the sky into a dense haze and turning the rising sun a deep, filtered orange — the same optical effect that scatters blue light and leaves only the longer red wavelengths to reach the eye. By late morning, the smoke had thickened enough to erase downtown Boston from the horizon entirely, a skyline that’s normally clearly visible from our summit.
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The sun reduced to a dim ember through smoke thick enough to filter out all but its reddest light — and our own instrument mast standing watch through it.
From our vantage point, the Boston skyline is normally a sharp, familiar sight on a clear day. Mid-morning on the 15th, it had all but vanished into the haze.
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Downtown Boston, normally sharp and clear from our summit, reduced to a faint outline beneath a yellow-brown haze.
Days like this are exactly why a continuous, long-term record matters — visibility, sky color, and haze are all part of what our observers note daily, adding one more data point to 141 years of watching the atmosphere change above Great Blue Hill.
