California's 2020 fire season

I intended to take the little one on a walk around the neighbourhood at 8am one day in early September. As I was placing him in the baby carrier, I kept wondering why the sky was so dark and gloomy, given that it's supposed to be a warm sunny day. As we walked out the door, I noticed that there was ash sprinkled all over outside. It reminded me of the day Mount Pinatubo's eruption in the 1990s and the more recent eruption of Taal Volcano. And when I looked up, the sky was a deep orange hue... it was so uncanny that I decided to stop and take a photo before retreating indoors.

Ahh, the 2020 California fire season had begun. And the glowing orange sky I saw that day was also seen by a lot of other people in the Bay Area. The thick smoke that made the air quality really bad that morning came from multiple fires in northern California, Oregon, and Washington being blown by the wind into the Bay Area.

The fire that led to this orange sky started because of a dry lightning event in mid-August that sparked wildfires all over northern California. The lightning event was part of thunderstorms that stemmed from Tropical Storm Fausto coming in from the Pacific. Don't be fooled by the "tropical storm" tag though; we received the lightning but not the rain. This fire is now called the North Complex Fire and it is still burning, becoming the sixth-largest fire in California's modern history at more than 125,000 hectares. Thankfully, it is almost 80% contained already. It has burned through two national forests (Lassen and Plumas).

Checking my phone for the daily air quality index and sunrise has become part of my daily morning routine.

A few weeks later, I was pretty confident that the fire season was ending. As I prepared to go on a walk with my son to the park on the hill, I noticed that the sky was hazy once again. I thought it would make for a good walk because the wind was brisk and the wee one could use some fresh air. Once outside though, we were greeted with a red sunrise and the landscape looked like it came straight from the set of Gladiator. 

Was this fire still connected with the North Complex Fire?

So I watched the news and learned that another wildfire was burning hot and fast in Napa and Sonoma counties, affecting St Helena, Calistoga, and Napa. This fire is called the Glass Fire because it began near the Glass Mountain Road. Unlike the North Complex Fire, the reason behind the Glass fire is still undetermined. The fire damaged several wineries including Castello di Amorosa, a winery Val and I visited with Anna in April last year. Residents of several cities were put on mandatory evacuation orders; a tough call while in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The fire, which is burning through more than 25 hectares of farm and forest land, generated enough smoke that hovered over parts of the Bay Area.

Which gave us another round of red dawns and gloomy mornings.

The air quality became so bad again that I decided to skip our early morning walks to the park for a few days. The haze made visibility poor across Honker Bay.

And then, as we welcomed October, the view cleared. The sky was overcast but I could see all the way to the wind farms up in the Montezuma Hills. I think that this is the clearest we've seen the view in a few weeks.

I bet that the view is at its most stunning when the sky is clear. I'm looking forward to see that when it happens.