Science Diary: Mims – Sunsets

Science Diary: Mims Sunsets

music; ambience Mauna Loa observatory

“Next time you’re with a friend or family and you’re watching a sunset, and if it’s a really nice sunset, surprise them by turning around 180 degrees and looking at the opposite horizon.”

That’s Forrest Mims, a citizen scientist who uses a variety of highly technical instruments to measure atmospheric conditions. In fact, he’s even invented a few. But as Mims illustrates, there is a world of environmental information that each of us can tap into. Welcome to Pulse of the Planet’s Science Diaries, a glimpse of the world of science from the inside.

“And if it’s just at sunset, you’re going to see a nice, pink glow across the opposite side of the sky. That’s called the anti-twilight glow. And it’s full of interesting scientific information. We’ve just had a wonderful sunset at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. The interesting thing about sunsets here is that you can see things in the atmosphere you might not think are there. There’s a dark black line across the horizon above where the sun set, and that’s volcanic gasses from Kilauea, on the other side of the island. And they tend to float around during the day, and then the sun heats them up, and they rise up and form this dark layer in the sky. Sulfur dioxide is what it primarily is. And then you can see that the sky below that layer is actually very clear, because you can see some of the other islands off in the distance. Now today we have some cirrus clouds, but there’s no significant Chinese dust. The last several days, the sky at sunset is just rippling with Chinese dust. These are dust storms from the Gobi Desert. And it made it hard to do some of the atmospheric measurements that I come to Hawaii to do. But it’s also very interesting to photograph them and to measure them. The dust isn’t just mineral dust. It also contains air pollution: ozone, sulfur dioxide, carbon particles from burning of power plants in China. And all that’s detected here at the Mauna Loa observatory, center of the Pacific Ocean.”

Please check out our website, pulseplanet.com. Pulse of the Planet’s Science Diaries are made possible by the National Science Foundation. I’m Jim Metzner.

Science Diary: Mims - Sunsets

Next time a beautiful sunset presents itself to you, look the other way. There's lots to learn on the opposite horizon.
Air Date:05/27/2008
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Science Diary: Mims Sunsets

music; ambience Mauna Loa observatory

“Next time you’re with a friend or family and you’re watching a sunset, and if it’s a really nice sunset, surprise them by turning around 180 degrees and looking at the opposite horizon.”

That’s Forrest Mims, a citizen scientist who uses a variety of highly technical instruments to measure atmospheric conditions. In fact, he’s even invented a few. But as Mims illustrates, there is a world of environmental information that each of us can tap into. Welcome to Pulse of the Planet’s Science Diaries, a glimpse of the world of science from the inside.

“And if it’s just at sunset, you’re going to see a nice, pink glow across the opposite side of the sky. That’s called the anti-twilight glow. And it’s full of interesting scientific information. We’ve just had a wonderful sunset at the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii. The interesting thing about sunsets here is that you can see things in the atmosphere you might not think are there. There’s a dark black line across the horizon above where the sun set, and that’s volcanic gasses from Kilauea, on the other side of the island. And they tend to float around during the day, and then the sun heats them up, and they rise up and form this dark layer in the sky. Sulfur dioxide is what it primarily is. And then you can see that the sky below that layer is actually very clear, because you can see some of the other islands off in the distance. Now today we have some cirrus clouds, but there’s no significant Chinese dust. The last several days, the sky at sunset is just rippling with Chinese dust. These are dust storms from the Gobi Desert. And it made it hard to do some of the atmospheric measurements that I come to Hawaii to do. But it’s also very interesting to photograph them and to measure them. The dust isn’t just mineral dust. It also contains air pollution: ozone, sulfur dioxide, carbon particles from burning of power plants in China. And all that’s detected here at the Mauna Loa observatory, center of the Pacific Ocean.”

Please check out our website, pulseplanet.com. Pulse of the Planet’s Science Diaries are made possible by the National Science Foundation. I’m Jim Metzner.