I woke up on Mars this morning. At this time of the morning, the sun is up and the sky should be blue. →[More:]

But instead, the sky is red/orange and the light is this weird yellow. Yellow sunlight generally means smoke from bushfires, but this is a dust-storm from the Central West of NSW.

Bits of the Outback have landed on my car.

There is dust everywhere. I'm thinking about Kim Stanley Robinson's "Red Mars" book where the explorers complain about the fine particulates getting into everything. Including my lungs. Heaven help any asthmatics today.

Visibility is low. Sydney airport is diverting to Brisbane and Melbourne and this dust cloud has covered most of the state. The mobile phone tower is only a couple of hundred metres away but it's pretty murky.

I can feel my nose burning and I'm already a bit throaty. It's not even 8:30am and I've only been outside once to take the photo's. Not even five minutes total. Jesus. Today is going to be hell.