In early March 2020, strong winds lofted dust from Africa over the Atlantic Ocean. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite acquired this image of the dust as it moved out from the coast of Morocco and Western Sahara on March 8, 2020.
This is the latest in a series of dust storms to affect the region in recent weeks. Unlike the event in late February that disrupted air and land travel in the Canary Islands, this event is not expected to bring a significant amount of dust and sand to the islands.
NASA Earth Observatory image by Joshua Stevens, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS/LANCE and GIBS/Worldview. Text by Kathryn Hansen.