Bringing new meaning to “red skies at night.” Photo: Shark Bay Caravan Park
The Western Australian skies were terrifyingly beautiful on Friday night. As Tropical Cyclone Narelle bore down, video filmed at Shark Bay Caravan Park showed a bright red sky.
“Incredibly eerie outside and everything is covered in dust,” the park wrote in an accompanying Facebook post. “No filter. This is it. You can feel the dust in your eyes and mouth.”
According to reports, the apocalyptic skies were due to a vast amount of dust filling the air. The soil in much of Australia is rich in iron. Since it’s a hot and dry place, that iron oxidizes, giving it a red hue.
“Australia happens to have a perfect environment, hot and dry, for a particular form of chemical weathering called oxidation,” NOAA explained. “This occurs in rocks that contain high amounts of iron. In this type of environment, these rocks actually begin to rust. As the rust expands, it weakens the rock and helps break it apart. The oxides produced through this process give the ground its reddish hue.”
Thankfully, the cyclone didn’t cause much damage — it was downgraded to a tropical low that brought relatively high winds and heavy rains — but the red sky that came along with it won’t be forgotten for quite some time. It’s not the first time, either. Back in 2019, when fires were out of control and burning much of Australia’s east coast, a similar event occurred.
