This post was written on Friday. I got up a little earlier than usual this morning. The sun had not risen yet and the sky on the horizon was red. That brought to mind the saying "Red sky in the morning, sailor take warning and red sky at night, sailor's delight". When I've been on sailing trips, I have often looked for that weather predictor. I can't remember if it was an accurate weather predictor or not.
I was curious about the reasoning behind this saying and I found this explanation on Wikipedia. "Weather systems typically move from west to east, and red clouds result when the sun shines on their undersides at either sunrise or sunset.[6][7] At these two times of day, the sun's light is passing at a very low angle through a great thickness of atmosphere, the result of which is the scattering out of most of the shorter wavelengths — the greens, blues, and violets — of the visible spectrum, and so sunlight is heavy at the red end of the spectrum. If the morning skies are red, it is because clear skies to the east permit the sun to light the undersides of moisture-bearing clouds coming in from the west. Conversely, in order to see red clouds in the evening, sunlight must have a clear path from the west in order to illuminate moisture-bearing clouds moving off to the east. There are many variations on this piece of lore, but they all carry the same message."
Even though there were red skies this morning, the weather forecast for today is sunny skies. The next time I go on a sailing trip, I'll get up early and have coffee while I read the sky for it's weather prediction. Then I'll listen to the weather forecast and decide what I'll do that day based on the forecast. Where's cousin Larry, the meteorologist, when you need him?
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