For a few days in October 2017, the tail end of hurricane Ophelia whipped up dust into the atmosphere from the Sahara and fanned Iberian wildfires which were belching smoke into the atmosphere. The combined effect of suspended atmospheric particles was to scatter sunlight and absorb the blue end of the spectrum of sunlight, leaving only the red. So at 14.43 on the 17th of October, the sun emerged briefly from behind low clouds to look as though it was setting -but high in the sky. It was an apocalyptic vision and everyone found it very eerie. The overall light when the sun was behind clouds was still strange, and very diffuse and directionless. So much so that I noticed we were not casting any shadows. That was very strange indeed!