The Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS), flying aboard Orbview-2, captured this true-color perspective on the large Asian dust storm visible over the Sea of Japan and the North Pacific Ocean on March 17, 2002. Dust storms such as this one originate in the deserts of China and Mongolia. They are an annual spring time event in East Asia and have been exacerbated in recent years by decades of deforestation.
The black regions are gaps between consecutive SeaWiFS’ viewing swaths and represent areas where no data were collected.
SeaWiFS image courtesy the SeaWiFS Project, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, and ORBIMAGE
