RED OCTOBER
Britain wakes up to breathtaking crimson sunrise
IT’S always a struggle to get up on a Monday. But those who hit the snooze button yesterday were left kicking themselves after seeing what they missed.
early birds were treated to a sensational sunrise at around 7.10am as the skies turned spectacular shades of red, orange and purple.
They stretched from the South Coast to the North east with stunning images taken in locations such as Selsey, West Sussex, where the sky shone a brilliant crimson and gold over the Channel.
On the east Coast, the pier at Saltburn-by-the-Sea in North Yorkshire and St Mary’s Lighthouse, further north in Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear, were silhouetted against a more ominous-looking – but no less dazzling – display.
A red sky appears when dust is trapped in the atmosphere by high pressure. This interrupts blue light and allows only red to come through. It is such sights as these that gave rise to one of our oldest proverbs – ‘red sky in the morning, shepherd’s warning’.
The saying holds true as forecasters predicted unsettled, changeable and windy weather this week. Rain was expected to spread from the West to the east last night before clearing in the early hours of today.
experts claim that red skies occur in the morning, as opposed to evening, after a high-pressure system – light winds and reduced cloud – has moved east. This means good weather coming from the Atlantic has passed and will most likely be followed by a wet and windy low-pressure system.
A Met Office spokesman said: ‘[It] does suggest bad weather on the way. It’s a sign that cloud is rising and that tends to signify worse weather in terms of rainfall.’