‘It’s crazy’: Bay Area residents astounded by eerie, orange, smoke-filtered skies

OAKLAND, Calif. - The Bay Area was blanketed in an orange haze on Wednesday, much to the surprise of many residents.

Some people described it like waking up on Mars or living in a world of falling ash. The hazy skies are due to the wildfires burning in Northern California with the wind bringing the smoke to the Bay Area. A thick layer of smoke has prevented the sunlight from peeking through, creating an orange haze.

Angela Yuen of Oakland took her dog out for a walk at Lake Merritt where the streetlights and lampposts were on in the middle of the morning. Yuen was a bit disoriented when her alarm went off.

“I woke up this morning and it was a really eerie feeling. I felt like, ‘Did I mess up? Is it nighttime? What’s going on?’,” she said. “It’s really disorienting. It kind of feels like Armageddon.”

Jerry Hallingan of Fremont went out for his daily walk at a local park and said he wasn’t bothered by the ash or haze.

“It’s disappointing, but it didn’t hold us back,” Halligan said. “Some people find it unhealthy to be here so they choose not to. However, we are the healthy ones… or maybe the stupid ones.”

The orange backdrop made some appreciate earth’s ordinarily blue skies.

“We are in end time,” Marc Goldstein said. “Looks like we’re in an apocoplyse. Whatever you think about a zombie apocalypse that’s what we look like right now.”