File:Dust in Northwestern Africa (MODIS 2022-04-23).jpg

English: An expansive Saharan dust storm covered much of northwestern Africa in late April 2022. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board NASA’s Terra satellite acquired a true-color image of the sandy scene on April 21. At that time, pink-tinted clouds of sand and dust stretched over more than 1,500 miles (2,414 km) from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea. Although only Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia are captured in this image, the vast blanket of dust also covered parts of Morocco, Western Sahara, and Mauritania. There is not a single point source that is responsible for this dust storm, rather strong winds blowing across a large part of the Sahara Desert has lofted sand and dust aloft over a long stretch of northwestern Africa. A thick area of dust near the lower left (southeast) section of the image sits over Erg Chech in Algeria, one of many sand seas located in Algeria, Mauritania, and Mali. These sandy deserts provide ample material for dust storms.