A river of Saharan dust is flowing northeastward from the deserts of northern Africa in this Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) image captured by the MODIS sensor on NASA’s Terra satellite on May 4, 2004. The airborne river stretches northward over the Mediterranean Sea for more than 1,000 kilometers and is several hundred kilometers wide in places. The dust is spreading across the heel of the “boot” of Italy at top right.
The high-resolution image provided above is 500 meters per pixel. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at additional resolutions.Image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA-GSFC
