Dust Storm Sweeps Across Montana

On February 1, 2020, residents of central Montana witnessed one of the worst dust storms the area has experienced in recent years. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite acquired this image of the storm around Great Falls.

The dust was stirred up by wind gusts of more than 110 kilometers (70 miles) per hour; they also fanned smoke and debris from a fire. As visibility in the area dropped to zero, the blowing dust halted traffic and caused accidents on a local highway, which was subsequently closed.

• References and Further Reading

• Great Falls Tribune (2020, February 1) Dust storm triggers crashes between Great Falls and Carter. Accessed February 4, 2020.
• KRTV (2020, February 1) Dust storm triggers crashes between Great Falls and Carter. Accessed February 4, 2020.

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NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS/LANCE and GIBS/Worldview. Text by Kasha Patel.

Published February 5, 2020
Data acquired February 1, 2020

Source:

Aqua > MODIS