UK climate: Sahara dust cloud headed to UK as Met Office warns cars could be covered in dirt

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The Met Office has warned an enormous Saharan dust cloud could be heading in the direction of the United Kingdom.

Last 12 months an analogous cloud introduced spectacular sunsets however motorists noticed their autos covered in a positive dust that had travelled practically 5,000km from the Sahara Desert. It is predicted the brand new plume will be washed down from the environment by rain falling as purple dirt on Sunday afternoon.

A Met Office spokesperson, posted on X: “This amazing image captures a plume of Saharan dust moving out of Africa and into the Atlantic. Some of this dust will make its way towards us over the coming days…”

Nick Finnis, meteorologist with Netweather, wrote on the service’s weblog: “The strengthening southerly wind on Sunday ahead of the cold front moving in from the west will also pull north Sahara dust that’s been spilling out of west Africa out across the Atlantic today.

“The dust load greatest across northern and western areas on Sunday – where southerly wind will be strongest, before the greatest dust load shifts further south and east on Monday.

“Some of this dust will fall onto surfaces on the ground, such as cars, more particularly where rain is expected with an area of low pressure moving northeast… There is some uncertainty over the path of this rain across England and Wales for now.”

A sustained higher wind for a interval of days permits uninterrupted journey for the dust in one course, lengthy sufficient for the circulation of air to attain the UK.

Dust brings spectacular purple sunsets as a result of particles in the environment scatter blue mild greater than purple, which is why the sky seems blue in the course of the day.

When the solar is low in the sky, like at daybreak and nightfall, the sunshine has farther to journey and so the blue mild is scattered an excessive amount of for us to see it, with the Saharan dust exacerbating this impact and turning the skies a deeper purple.

The warning got here as yellow wind warning is in place for north-east Scotland, with gusts of 50-60mph with an opportunity of 70mph in uncovered areas.

Met Office meteorologist Craig Snell mentioned: “In southern parts it will be a dryer weekend with sunny spells, but there will be a fair bit of cloud around.

“In the north it will remain changeable.”

Sunday is predicted to be very delicate, reaching 15C in some locations, though it’ll stay moist and windy in the North West.

In the South East it ought to keep vibrant and largely dry, however there’s a likelihood of cloud cowl at instances.

Mr Snell mentioned: “On Sunday, it will turn quite windy again.

“It will be a short-lived windy spell, with gusts reaching 50-60mph in some places but it will not be anything like the recent storms.”