![]() “Note that the shape of the wave train matches with the west African coastline rather well, with some distortion of course due to different wind speeds at different latitudes,” said Tianle Yuan, an atmospheric scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and University of Maryland Baltimore County. In this case, the air mass coming off the west African continent was disturbed by the lower-altitude air mass near the sea surface. Such waves can be caused by the rise and fall of an air mass that has been disturbed. The dust is likely organizing along otherwise invisible waves in the atmosphere. Notice that the dust has organized into a series of linear bands close to the archipelago’s eastern islands. But when viewed from space, interesting patterns emerge. The storm was not much more than a hazy orange nuisance to people on the ground. Wind gusts reached 70 kilometers (40 miles) per hour. The Ministry of Heath advised people, especially those with respiratory issues, to stay inside with doors and windows closed. With the arrival of the dust, visibility dropped to 1.6 kilometers (1 mile) at the airport on Gran Canaria and 1.8 kilometers (1.2 miles) on Fuerteventura and Tenerife South, according to local news reports. ![]() Later that evening, the warning was extended to Gran Canaria and Tenerife. At the time, Spain’s meteorological agency (AEMET) had issued a warning to the islands of Lanzarote and Fuerteventura for high winds and suspended dust. The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the NOAA-20 satellite acquired an image (above) around 1:45 p.m. Such events, known to islanders as “la calima,” generally happen around this time of year as strong seasonal winds carry sand and dust away from the Sahara. In mid-January 2022, dust from northwest Africa washed over the Canary Islands, causing skies to turn orange, visibility to drop, and air quality to decline.
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