As summer winds down in West Africa, so does much of the region\u2019s dust activity. Dust storms can still occur, though, as one did in early September 2026, when a plume covered parts of Mali and neighboring countries.<\/p>\n
The\u00a0MODIS<\/a>\u00a0(Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) on NASA\u2019s Terra<\/a> satellite captured this image on September 5, 2026. According to Tianle Yuan, an atmospheric scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, storms like this one are often associated with haboobs<\/a>\u2014powerful dust storms driven by strong convective winds.<\/p>\n In the days after this image was acquired, a wider satellite view<\/a> showed aerosols from the region moving westward and spilling over the Atlantic Ocean. However, a full transatlantic crossing is unlikely. Such crossings are more common from late spring through summer, when the Saharan Air Layer<\/a>\u2014a dry, dusty mass of air\u2014can carry dust thousands of miles westward from Africa, riding high in the atmosphere.<\/p>\n Looking ahead, the developing El Ni\u00f1o<\/a> could reshape these patterns. For instance, Yuan noted that the phenomenon can affect dust over the Sahel and Mali by shifting the Intertropical Convergence Zone<\/a> and altering convection patterns, though the influence cuts both ways. Drier conditions can leave more loose sediment available for winds to lift, but less convective activity also means fewer intense storms (haboobs) to kick up large dust plumes in the first place. \u201cThe connection can be real,\u201d Yuan said, \u201cbut hard to pin down for individual events.\u201d<\/p>\n NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using MODIS data from NASA\u00a0<\/em>EOSDIS LANCE<\/em><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>GIBS\/Worldview<\/em><\/a>.<\/em>\u00a0Story by Kathryn Hansen.<\/em><\/p>\n
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