(WVNS) – If you’ve had the opportunity to step outside the last day or so, you may have noticed the sky looking a little milky at times. The thick haze isn’t clouds, but smoke from a cluster of wildfires burning in Ontario, Canada.

According to the NASA Earth Observatory, the fires have sent smoke up into the atmosphere, which has since spread into the mid-Atlantic states. The National Weather Service in Duluth, Minnesota had to issue “Air Quality Alerts” last week due to the hazards the extra smoke particles are causing for their forecast area.

Since then, the upper atmosphere winds have shifted, bringing the smoke towards the mid-Atlantic states, including West Virginia and Virginia. This has caused our skies to turn a milky white during the day at times. The extra thick smoky haze also had an interesting effect on our sunsets.

Viewer photos from around the region on Monday showed a blazing red sunset across the two Virginias. The smoke scatters some of the colors in the light spectrum making them more pronounced. In our case, reds, oranges and pinks are scattered, making our sunsets and sunrises that much more spectacular.

The smoke from the wildfires is expected to stay in our region for a few more days, meaning if you missed out on Monday’s dazzling sunset, you’ll have another opportunity on Tuesday and Wednesday.

If you’d like to send in your sunset or sunrise photos, you can do so via email at news@wvnstv.com or on our 59News Facebook page.