A massive plume of dust from the Sahara Desert is drifting across the Atlantic Ocean and is expected to blanket parts of the southeastern U.S. this week.
, Antigua and other islands in the region, according to The Associated Press.
It’s not unusual for dust plumes that originate in Africa to get carried thousands of miles across the ocean, but Gill said this particular event is especially large and intense. NASA astronaut Doug Hurley, who is currently aboard the International Space Station, snapped a dramatic photo Sunday showing the immensity of the plume over the west-central Atlantic Ocean.
These types of dust clouds occur every year when a mass of very dry air, known as the Saharan Air Layer, forms over the Sahara Desert. The plumes form when “ripples in the lower to middle atmosphere, called tropical waves, track along the southern edge of the Sahara Desert and loft vast amounts of dust into the atmosphere,” Jason Dunion, an associate scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Hurricane Research Division, said in a statement.
“That’s the silver lining with these dust clouds,” Gill said. “It has to do with the dryness of the air mass because you need very, very moist air to create things like tropical storms or hurricanes.”
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