Just Ask the Dinosaurs How Bad Air Quality Can Get
The article compares current air quality issues caused by Canadian wildfires to the catastrophic environmental conditions following the asteroid impact that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. It emphasizes the severity of global smoke and darkness that occurred 66 million years ago.
Why it matters
It provides historical context for modern climate-related events, illustrating the potential scale of environmental disasters.
If an orange sky seems apocalyptic, imagine planet-wide fires against a black sky.
Illustration by The Atlantic July 17, 2026, 6:42 PM ET Share Save The air quality this week is bad. Smoke from Canadian wildfires has turned the sky orange in Philadelphia. It has veiled the Statue of Liberty in Manhattan. In Detroit, which has dealt with some of the worst conditions in the country, the smoke has almost entirely blurred the city’s skyline. The eastern United States isn’t exactly accustomed to smoke days, which can prompt someone like me, from the wildfire-prone West, to brag about how they’ve seen far worse. But those smoke days are nothing compared with the ones 66 million years ago. If you want to talk about bad air quality, ask the dinosaurs.
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