This will help - things like actual solar eclipses and lunar eclipses - are not what is talked about in Matt 24. Rather the "signs" will be more like this -
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-18097177
There were many fires in Florida a few years ago and it put a haze in the sky here in Georgia - and you could easily smell ash/smoke. Nobody who had ever seen fire or been around fire was mistaking it for a 'sign'.
No something very strange happened here in May 19, 1780
http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-18097177
No solar eclipse that day.
No lunar eclipse that day.
Nobody reported smoke or fire and no thick clouds as "the cause".
Three centuries ago in parts of North America, a strange event turned morning to night. It remains wreathed in mystery - so what caused the Dark Day?
Halfway through the morning the sky turns yellow. Animals run for cover and darkness descends, causing people to light candles and start to pray. By lunchtime night has fallen. Is it the end of the world?
The Dark Day, as it's become known, took place on May 19, 1780 in New England and parts of eastern Canada. For the past 232 years historians and scientists have argued over the origins of this strange event.
Today there are many theories. Was it the result of volcanic eruption, fire, meteor strike - or something more sinister?
When the makers of Doctor Who this week
asked fans of the show to send in their suggestions, they received a wide range of theories both plausible and Tardis-related.
With little scientific knowledge amongst the populace in 1780, people would have been afraid. Some lawmakers in Connecticut believed it was the day of judgement. The sense that a decisive moment was afoot would have been bolstered by the fact that during the preceding days, the sun and moon glowed red.
Historian Mike Dash says the north-east corner of the US was a deeply Protestant society with a profound interest in "guilt, sin and redemption". Dash, who wrote about the paranormal in his book Borderlands, says that faced with sudden darkness, people would look for biblical precedents.
"There are some verses in Matthew that might have led them to believe that this is the second coming of Christ. At the time, natural events - even birds fighting in the sky - were a sign of God's intentions. The Dark Day would have seemed like a warning to Man."
Deadly portents
So what might explain 1780's Dark Day?
The Met Office points out that
thick cloud can drop low enough to turn on automatic street lights and require cars to use their lights. But it's unlikely this alone would be enough to cause a Dark Day.
A
solar eclipse can be ruled out as there is a record of when these occur - and they only last for a matter of minutes.
The eruption of the volcano Eyjafjallajokull in 2010 caused enough ash to enter the atmosphere to ground flights across northern Europe.
Thomas Choularton, professor of atmospheric science at the University of Manchester, says volcanic ash clouds often cause "yellow days". Eruptions at Mount St Helens in Washington State have lowered light levels in recent decades, he adds.
And yet there is no record of
volcanic activity in 1780, he says, making a huge ash cloud an unlikely explanation. A
meteorite is equally unlikely, although "you can't rule it out completely", Prof Choularton says.
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People in California are facing a lot of fire storms this year - but not a one of them reporting a "mysterious darkening of the sky around the fires" as if "that is something we never encountered on planet earth".