Dust Storm off Western Sahara Coast

Dust storms have been sweeping across central and western Africa on and off since early January 2005. This image shows an immense dust event on February 16, 2005.

A dust storm from the central Sahara Desert in northern Africa was making its way westward, out over Western Sahara (top) and Mauritania (bottom) and on to the Atlantic Ocean on January 6, 2005. Dust storms such as this can cross the Atlantic and come down in the southern United States, the Caribbean, and South America. This image of the storm was captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite. The high-resolution image provided above is 500 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at additional resolutions.

Metadata

  • Sensor

    Terra/MODIS

  • Start Date

    2005-01-06

  • Event Start Date

    2005-01-01

  • NH Image ID

    12660

  • NH Event ID

    10572

  • NH Posting Date

    2005-01-07