Weather News

Red sky in the morning, shepherd's warning

Guy Dixon, Friday April 29, 2016 - 13:49 AEST

Sydney-siders were graced with a beautiful sunrise this morning, a hue of orange and pink to start the end of the week.

The old saying, "Red sky in the morning, shepherd's warning, red sky at night, shepherd's delight." actually has quite a bit of science behind it.

Today, conditions were primed with relatively poor air quality due to hazard reduction burns in the area and the perfect synoptic setup.

Usually, as a low pressure trough approaches from the west, a high pressure ridge will be residing to the east. Often an inversion can be found under areas of high pressure, a phenomenon where warm air rests on top of cold air. This is exactly what happened today.

As the pollutants in the air collected within this inversion, the morning sun shining through created a beautiful array of warm colours.

Ultimately, as the low pressure trough continues to bare down along its eastward movement, conditions will often deteriorate with wind, cloud and showers threatening, hence the shepherds and sailors warning each other.

This old saying is likely to prove itself correct once again with showers developing just in time for the weekend for Sydney, including much of NSW and the nation's southeast.

- Weatherzone

© Weatherzone 2016

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