Dust and Smoke over Iraq and the Middle East

Dust and Smoke over Iraq and the Middle East

On April 16, 2003, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Terra satellite captured this image of a dust storm washing over the Middle East, blanketing parts of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and southern Iraq with a thick cloud of sand and dust. The dust appears like a series of waves breaking over the region, with a lighter-colored outer wave reaching out over the Persian Gulf, and a more substantial wave arcing up from the bottom left of the image through image center.

mage courtesy Jacques Descloitres, MODIS Rapid Response Team at NASA GSFC