Dust Storm in China Spreads to Sea of Japan

The prevailing westerly winds in the mid-latitudes often blow dust from deserts in China and Mongolia toward Japan. In this pair of images from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra and Aqua satellites, a dust storm ripples across the deserts of Inner Mongolia on April 14, 2005 (Aqua MODIS, top), and spreads out over the Sea of Japan to the east on April 15 (Terra MODIS, bottom).

The high-resolution image provided above is 250 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides these images (

April 14

and

April 15

) at additional resolutions.

References & Resources

Image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA-GSFC

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April 14, 2005

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