Dust off Pakistan: Natural Hazards

Plumes of dust blew off the coasts of Pakistan and Iran on November 22, 2006. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/ (MODIS) flying on NASA's aqua.nasa.gov/ Aqua satellite captured this image of the dust plumes blowing over the Arabian Sea the same day. In this image, the dust appears as elongated clouds of pale beige heading towards the southwest. The thickest plume blows off Pakistan, some 500 kilometers east of the border with Iran. Other plumes appear more transparent. As the plumes advance far enough off the coast, they appear to change direction, perhaps due to a weather system associated with the clouds in the south.