“Although Sandy was a Category 3 storm when it made landfall in Cuba, it became the largest Atlantic hurricane on record when measured by diameter, with winds spanning 900 miles,” said Chapman University Climatologist Hesham El-Askary, Ph.D.

A Saharan dust event occurring in West Africa weeks before Sandy had formed carried large amounts of mineral dust into the troposphere, filling the tropical wave that became Sandy with aerosols along a majority of its path. By monitoring dust storms, Dr. El-Askary was able to tie this occurrence to the role it played in the hurricane’s development from a Category 1 to a Category 3 storm. With this work, he hopes to provide more accurate forecasting for these types of extreme weather occurrences.

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The research, titled “Characterizing the Impact of Aerosols on Pre-Hurricane Sandy” was published in the IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing. Dr. El-Askary investigates the impact that African dust storms over the Atlantic played in the formation of the tropical storm system that eventually became Hurricane Sandy in October 2012. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8345587/

Abstract:

This study focuses on the role that African dust over the Atlantic had on the persistence of the tropical system that eventually became Hurricane Sandy in October 2012. On October 8, a Saharan dust event in the Mauritania region of West Africa transported significant amounts of mineral dust into the troposphere and along the path of an easterly wave created by a break in the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ). The Terra/Aqua-MODIS satellite observations clearly define the spatial distribution of the coarse/fine aerosols, while the CALIPSO observations of the total attenuated backscatter at 532 nm provide a detailed view of the vertical structure and aerosol types in the dust-laden layer. European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts and Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, Version 2 reanalysis data show the distribution of aerosols along the path of the pre-Sandy wave as well as a second wave that formed north of the ITCZ under different condition. The second wave, which started in an area of relatively larger aerosol optical depth (AOD), moved into an area with abnormally low convective available potential energy and AOD, subsequently dying out, while the wave that became Sandy had light aerosol loading (AOD between 0.15–0.5) along a majority of its path. The evidence suggests that aerosols played a nontrivial role in the maintenance of this system until it moved into an environment favorable for cyclogenesis.