Images
October 2, 2024 - Dust Across Asia and Europe
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Heavy dust swept across parts of Asia and Eastern Europe in late September 2024, crossing the Caspian Sea and darkening skies in eastern Ukraine. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite acquired this true-color image of the wide-spread dust storms on September 30.
Several areas of moving dust are visible in this image. The Caspian Sea, which sits between Asia (east) and Eastern Europe (west), is covered by a long, undulating river of dust that is so thick that it obscures the water from view. While the source of this dust isn’t entirely clear, it appears most comes from the dry, mineral-encrusted shores near Garabogazköl, the shallow, highly saline bay east of the Caspian Sea. In the east, pale dust streams from the remnants of the Aral Sea, which straddles Kazakhstan (north) and Uzbekistan (south).
A third cloud of dust rises from the dune fields located near the Volga River west of the Caspian Sea. These dark streamers of dust blow to the northwest, towards Ukraine, where a large, dense cloud of dust ducks under the cloud layer and covers that country. Media reported that visibility was limited to 3-6 kilometers (1.8-3.7 miles) in Zaporizhzhia due to the dust blowing in from Russia.
Image Facts
Satellite:
Aqua
Date Acquired: 9/30/2024
Resolutions:
1km (2.3 MB),
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit:
MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC
Heavy dust swept across parts of Asia and Eastern Europe in late September 2024, crossing the Caspian Sea and darkening skies in eastern Ukraine. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite acquired this true-color image of the wide-spread dust storms on September 30.
Several areas of moving dust are visible in this image. The Caspian Sea, which sits between Asia (east) and Eastern Europe (west), is covered by a long, undulating river of dust that is so thick that it obscures the water from view. While the source of this dust isn’t entirely clear, it appears most comes from the dry, mineral-encrusted shores near Garabogazköl, the shallow, highly saline bay east of the Caspian Sea. In the east, pale dust streams from the remnants of the Aral Sea, which straddles Kazakhstan (north) and Uzbekistan (south).
A third cloud of dust rises from the dune fields located near the Volga River west of the Caspian Sea. These dark streamers of dust blow to the northwest, towards Ukraine, where a large, dense cloud of dust ducks under the cloud layer and covers that country. Media reported that visibility was limited to 3-6 kilometers (1.8-3.7 miles) in Zaporizhzhia due to the dust blowing in from Russia.
Image Facts
Satellite:
Aqua
Date Acquired: 9/30/2024
Resolutions:
1km (2.3 MB),
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit:
MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC
