Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations
International audience The present study investigates aerosols distributions and a strong Sahara dust-storm event that occurred by early August 2018, in the South of Morocco. We used columnar aerosol optical depth (AOD), Angstrom Exponent (AE) and volume size distributions (VSD) as derived from grou...
Published in: | Remote Sensing |
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Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
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Online Access: | https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/document https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/file/remotesensing-14-02454.pdf https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14102454 |
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ftinsu:oai:HAL:hal-03681065v1 2023-06-18T03:35:40+02:00 Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations Bencherif, Hassan Bounhir, Aziza Bègue, Nelson Millet, Tristan Benkhaldoun, Zouhair Lamy, Kévin Portafaix, Thierry Gadouali, Fouad Laboratoire de l'Atmosphère et des Cyclones (LACy) Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université de La Réunion (UR)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Météo-France Université Cadi Ayyad Marrakech (UCA) 2022-05-20 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/document https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/file/remotesensing-14-02454.pdf https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14102454 en eng HAL CCSD MDPI info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.3390/rs14102454 hal-03681065 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/document https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/file/remotesensing-14-02454.pdf doi:10.3390/rs14102454 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ info:eu-repo/semantics/OpenAccess ISSN: 2072-4292 Remote Sensing https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065 Remote Sensing, 2022, 14 (10), pp.2454. ⟨10.3390/rs14102454⟩ aerosol optical depth Sahara dust Morocco AERONET dust transport [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-AO-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics [physics.ao-ph] info:eu-repo/semantics/article Journal articles 2022 ftinsu https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14102454 2023-06-05T20:32:48Z International audience The present study investigates aerosols distributions and a strong Sahara dust-storm event that occurred by early August 2018, in the South of Morocco. We used columnar aerosol optical depth (AOD), Angstrom Exponent (AE) and volume size distributions (VSD) as derived from ground-based observations by 2 AERONET (AErosol RObotic NETwork) sun-photometers at Saada (31.63°N, 8.16°W) and Ouarzazate (30.93°N, 6.91°W) sites, over the periods 2004–2019 and2012–2015, respectively. The monthly seasonal distributions of AOD, AE, and VSD showed a seasonal trend dominated by the annual cycle, with a maximum aerosol load during summer (July–August) and a minimum in winter (December–January), characterized by a coarse mode near the radius of 2.59 µm and a fine mode at the radius of 0.16 µm , respectively. Indeed, this study showed that aerosol populations in southern Morocco are dominated by Saharan desert dust, especially during the summer season. The latter can sometimes be subject of dust-storm events. The case study presented in this paper reports on one of these events, which happened in early August 2018. The HYSPLIT (HYbrid Single Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory) model was used to simulate air-mass backtrajectories during the event. In agreement with ground-based (AERONET sun-photometers) and satellite (CALIOP, MODIS and AIRS) observations, HYSPLIT back-trajectories showed that the dust air-mass at the 4-km layer, the average height of the dust plume, has crossed southern Morocco over the Saada site, with a westward direction towards the Atlantic Ocean, before it changed northward up to the Portuguese coasts. Article in Journal/Newspaper Aerosol Robotic Network Institut national des sciences de l'Univers: HAL-INSU Remote Sensing 14 10 2454 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Institut national des sciences de l'Univers: HAL-INSU |
op_collection_id |
ftinsu |
language |
English |
topic |
aerosol optical depth Sahara dust Morocco AERONET dust transport [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-AO-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics [physics.ao-ph] |
spellingShingle |
aerosol optical depth Sahara dust Morocco AERONET dust transport [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-AO-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics [physics.ao-ph] Bencherif, Hassan Bounhir, Aziza Bègue, Nelson Millet, Tristan Benkhaldoun, Zouhair Lamy, Kévin Portafaix, Thierry Gadouali, Fouad Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations |
topic_facet |
aerosol optical depth Sahara dust Morocco AERONET dust transport [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-AO-PH]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics [physics.ao-ph] |
description |
International audience The present study investigates aerosols distributions and a strong Sahara dust-storm event that occurred by early August 2018, in the South of Morocco. We used columnar aerosol optical depth (AOD), Angstrom Exponent (AE) and volume size distributions (VSD) as derived from ground-based observations by 2 AERONET (AErosol RObotic NETwork) sun-photometers at Saada (31.63°N, 8.16°W) and Ouarzazate (30.93°N, 6.91°W) sites, over the periods 2004–2019 and2012–2015, respectively. The monthly seasonal distributions of AOD, AE, and VSD showed a seasonal trend dominated by the annual cycle, with a maximum aerosol load during summer (July–August) and a minimum in winter (December–January), characterized by a coarse mode near the radius of 2.59 µm and a fine mode at the radius of 0.16 µm , respectively. Indeed, this study showed that aerosol populations in southern Morocco are dominated by Saharan desert dust, especially during the summer season. The latter can sometimes be subject of dust-storm events. The case study presented in this paper reports on one of these events, which happened in early August 2018. The HYSPLIT (HYbrid Single Particle Lagrangian Integrated Trajectory) model was used to simulate air-mass backtrajectories during the event. In agreement with ground-based (AERONET sun-photometers) and satellite (CALIOP, MODIS and AIRS) observations, HYSPLIT back-trajectories showed that the dust air-mass at the 4-km layer, the average height of the dust plume, has crossed southern Morocco over the Saada site, with a westward direction towards the Atlantic Ocean, before it changed northward up to the Portuguese coasts. |
author2 |
Laboratoire de l'Atmosphère et des Cyclones (LACy) Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université de La Réunion (UR)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Météo-France Université Cadi Ayyad Marrakech (UCA) |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Bencherif, Hassan Bounhir, Aziza Bègue, Nelson Millet, Tristan Benkhaldoun, Zouhair Lamy, Kévin Portafaix, Thierry Gadouali, Fouad |
author_facet |
Bencherif, Hassan Bounhir, Aziza Bègue, Nelson Millet, Tristan Benkhaldoun, Zouhair Lamy, Kévin Portafaix, Thierry Gadouali, Fouad |
author_sort |
Bencherif, Hassan |
title |
Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations |
title_short |
Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations |
title_full |
Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations |
title_fullStr |
Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations |
title_full_unstemmed |
Aerosol Distributions and Sahara Dust Transport in Southern Morocco, from Ground-Based and Satellite Observations |
title_sort |
aerosol distributions and sahara dust transport in southern morocco, from ground-based and satellite observations |
publisher |
HAL CCSD |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/document https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/file/remotesensing-14-02454.pdf https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14102454 |
genre |
Aerosol Robotic Network |
genre_facet |
Aerosol Robotic Network |
op_source |
ISSN: 2072-4292 Remote Sensing https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065 Remote Sensing, 2022, 14 (10), pp.2454. ⟨10.3390/rs14102454⟩ |
op_relation |
info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.3390/rs14102454 hal-03681065 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065 https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/document https://hal.univ-reunion.fr/hal-03681065/file/remotesensing-14-02454.pdf doi:10.3390/rs14102454 |
op_rights |
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ info:eu-repo/semantics/OpenAccess |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14102454 |
container_title |
Remote Sensing |
container_volume |
14 |
container_issue |
10 |
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2454 |
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