Climatology of dust distribution over West Asia from homogenized remote sensing data

Author(s)
Seyed Omid Nabavi, Leopold Haimberger, Cyrus Samimi
Abstract

In the past decade, West Asia has witnessed more frequent and intensified dust storms affecting Iran and Persian Gulf countries. Employing a varying threshold that takes into account systematic differences between TOMS and OMI data, TOMS-OMI Aerosol Index data are used to identify long-term changes in the horizontal distribution of dust storms in West Asia from 1980 to present. The northwest of Iraq and east of Syria are identified as emerging dusty areas, whereas east of Saudi Arabia and southeast of Iraq are identified as permanent dusty areas, including both dust sources and affected areas. Whereas the frequency of dust events increased slightly in the permanent dusty areas, it increased markedly in the emerging dusty areas. As expected, the frequency of dust events is highest in June and July.The dust source areas are identified as the Iraq-Saudi Arabia boundary region and (recently) the northwest of Iraq, using MODIS deep blue aerosol optical depth data. Subsequently, a lagged correlation was implemented between identified dust sources and whole West Asia to determine the main paths and receptors of intense dust storms. Accordingly, southwest of Iran and Persian Gulf countries were determined as main receptors of summertime dust storms in West Asia. During spring, dust storms mostly hit the northern half of the region and reach to the Caspian Sea. Analyzing atmospheric patterns, Shamal and Frontal patterns were found as dominant atmospheric circulations simultaneous with summertime and springtime dust storms, respectively.

Organisation(s)
Department of Meteorology and Geophysics
External organisation(s)
Universität Bayreuth
Journal
Aeolian Research
Volume
21
Pages
93–107
No. of pages
15
ISSN
1875-9637
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aeolia.2016.04.002
Publication date
06-2016
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
105906 Environmental geosciences, 105206 Meteorology
Keywords
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Earth-Surface Processes, Geology
Portal url
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/climatology-of-dust-distribution-over-west-asia-from-homogenized-remote-sensing-data(23c812be-8325-4fb6-a46b-68c798135129).html