July 10, 2022 - Massive Dust Storm in the Taklimakan

Massive Dust Storm in the Taklimakan
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A massive shroud of airborne dust covered the Taklamakan Desert in
early July 2022. Strong winds were moving dust across the desert—which
is one of the harshest, driest, and most barren places on
Earth—continuously since July 1. By July 7, when the Moderate
Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board NASA’s Terra
satellite acquired this true-color image, the dust was so thick that at
least 95 percent of the desert was obscured from view.

Located in Xinjiang province in western China, the Taklimakan Desert
sits in a depression formed by the tall Tien Shan Mountains to the
north and the Kunlun Mountains to the south. It is the largest desert
in China, and the largest shifting-sand desert in the world.
Eighty-five percent of the Taklimakan’s surface consists of
crescent-shaped dunes, some reaching a height of 200 meters (650 feet).
It is one of the main sources of dust-and-sand storms in China,
although, thanks to the encircling mountains, the dust usually remains
mostly confined within the Tarim Basin.

Dust storms are frequent across the Taklamakan Desert, with an average
of more than 100 sand-dust days each year across the entire basin. In
some areas, the average exceeds 200 days each year.

Image Facts
Satellite: Aqua
Date Acquired: 7/7/2022
Resolutions: 1km (6.6 MB), 500m (4.5 MB),
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit: MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC



https://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/individual.php?db_date=2022-07-10

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