Over the last few days, sunsets in Cayman have been hazy affairs, as the latest Sahara dust cloud passed by.
By Tuesday afternoon, however, the effects of the Saharan dust has decreased significantly, according to the National Weather Service.
Meteorologist Shamal Clarke told the Compass on Tuesday that the dust cloud was “expected to linger just through today”.
He said it had begun affecting Cayman on Saturday, 22 July.
Danielle Coleman, director of Hazard Management Cayman Islands, told the Compass that her department had been monitoring the dust cloud, which in some instances can affect air quality.
She said the Hazard Management team had not considered it necessary to issue a general advisory regarding air quality as “we don’t feel it has reached the threshold”.
The dust clouds have become annual occurrences, usually around July and August.
They begin life as micro-particles of dust and sand, mainly from the Sahara Desert in northern Africa. Those particles are carried by breezes and, later, strong prevailing winds and become suspended in huge plumes that can reach the upper atmosphere.
The cloud of dust is blown across the Atlantic by northeasterly trade winds to the Caribbean, Central and South America, and the southern states of the US.
The Barbados-based Caribbean Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology, the main body that monitors the sand and dust storms as they enter the Caribbean, in its latest seven-day forecast, shows the intensity of the dust cloud decreasing in this area from today.
Related Videos
