Photos >> Science Photo Gallery: Sydney's Blood-Red Dust Storm
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Science Photo Gallery: Sydney's Blood-Red Dust Storm
Created about 1 month ago Description: Sydney, AUS - Unusually strong 'westerly' winds and a decade-long drought in the inland part of southern Australia are to blame for the most intense dust storm this country has seen in seventy years. The result was a blood-red sky that pervaded ominously over hundreds of miles (through cities and fields), and even spread into nearby New Zealand, causing breathing problems, delayed flights, and apocalyptic fear. According to the regional director of New South Wales, the direct reason for the dust storms was due to an "intense north low pressure area [that] formed and generated gale-force westerly winds . . . and those winds pick up a lot of dust from the very dry interior of the continent.” Officially, the "dust" is actually topsoil surface dust from the desert, and it created a highly condesed pollution on the level of the worst days of smog in the most polluted of cities. A less obvious, but most likely true-origin reason for the dust storm is global warming. As noted in several publications, including New Scientist and Wired, the fact that significant regional climate change occurred in the country in the last fifty years contributed to the storm. The hotter the land, the fewer rain that has been accumulated in southern and eastern Australia. Others have disputed that the storms are a product of global warming and instead are based primarily on strong winds. According to ABC news, Australia has experienced severe dust storms for centuries, the most intense before this one coming during a period in the mid-1940s. Between 1944 and 1945, thirty-four dust storms were recorded. Australian officials have said no one got hurt from the sudden storm but hundreds of people still reported difficulty breathing. This caused the authorities to strongly urge older people, children, animals, and those with breathing problems to avoid going outside. Australian news reports said that many flights coming and out of the international airport were postponed or diverted and that some of the famous ferries that carry tourists and locals alike near the beautiful Sydney harbor were stopped completely. Category: WTF? (photos)
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