{"id":37665,"date":"2014-07-03T10:00:31","date_gmt":"2014-07-03T15:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=37665"},"modified":"2014-07-03T10:00:31","modified_gmt":"2014-07-03T15:00:31","slug":"dust-in-the-wind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2014\/07\/03\/dust-in-the-wind\/","title":{"rendered":"Seem Hazy in Central Texas? It’s All Saharan Dust in the Wind"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Taken by astronauts on International Space Station mission STS065 on July 11, 1994 \/ JSC Astromaterials Research & Exploration Science Directorate, NASA, The International Space Station<\/p>

This image, taken by astronauts in the International Space Station from 160 above Earth, shows a Saharan dust cloud floating across the Caribbean. The camera is pointed southwest and the land in the upper right is Haiti.<\/p><\/div>\n

Some Texans have been able to enjoy exceptional sunsets this week as billions of tiny grains of dust from afar traverses our skies.\u00a0A dusty drifter from 6,500 miles away —\u00a0a giant mass of super-fine sediment and dry air<\/a> from the Sahara Desert — is visiting Central Texas this week.<\/p>\n

Saharan dust blows across the Caribbean<\/a> and\u00a0passes through Texas<\/a> most summers, says meteorologist Jason Dunion<\/a> with the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration. The dust is blown out of Africa in giant windstorms.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat makes these things so incredible is how big they are. They\u2019re the size of the lower 48 states, so you\u2019re basically stirring up this continent-sized land mass and blasting it out into the Atlantic,\u201d says Dunion, who was the principle investigator in the Saharan Air Layer Group<\/a>.<\/p>\n