Why Does the Sky Appear Red at Sunrise/Sunset?

[AlchemistK]

I know that the sky appears blue because the blue light gets scattered the most due to its high frequency(according to Raleigh's law) but then during the sunset or sunrise, why does the sky appear red? Doesn't almost all of the blue light get scattered , and maybe just a small portion of red? Then why does the sky appear more red than blue?

 

[martix]

As I understood it:
Lower angle, more atmosphere to pass through, more scattering of shorter wavelengths, which in turn leaves only the longer(read: RED) wavelengths free to reach your eyes.

 

[AlchemistK]

Isn't it supposed to be that the light that gets scattered forms the color of the sky rather than the light left from the sun? Because during the day,as i know it, the blue light gets scattered and the sky appears blue and the rest reaches our eyes as it is.

 

[martix]

Consider the meaning of scatter :)
However transparent, air is still matter and has an effect on the light coming from the sun.
When a coherent beam hits the atmosphere, it gets scattered in all direction which means each molecule gets to "shine" with whatever color/wavelength it's diffusing.
At shorter atmospheric traveling distances shorter wavelengths are scattered and the sky shines blue, at longer distances it gets orange and red.

While we are on the subject, there is another mystery as well - why is it that the sky is blue and not violet, considering it is the shortest visible wavelength. :)

 

[AlchemistK]

Oh. I know that, the problem of us not seeing the sky violet is because of the the colour recptors in our eyes, they have a tendency towards blue more than violet, hence the sky appears more of a shade of blue. Atleast this is what i read somewhere.