Saharan dust cloud travelling to US after crossing Atlantic

Enormous plume has been seen via satellite stretching across Atlantic Ocean this week

An enormous dust cloud could soon cover parts of the United States after the natural phenomenon surged into the Caribbean Sea this weekend.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which has monitored the Saharan dust plume’s approach, says the American south could be hit later this week.

According to NOAA, dust and dry air forms above the Sahara Desert each late spring, summer and early autumn, which then moves over the tropical Atlantic.

NASA and NOAA satellites photographed the dust plume travelling over the North Atlantic Ocean on Thursday, before it rolled into the Caribbean Sea on Sunday.

When the phenomenon, otherwise known as the Saharan Air Layer (SAL), arrives above the US this week it would have moved some 5,000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean.

At the same time, the densest plume now stretches some 3,000 miles across, making the cloud larger than the contiguous United States and western Europe, says NOAA.

The NOAA's National Hurricane Center's (NHC) Tropical Analysis and Forecast Branch said on Twitter on Sunday that the cloud was moving westward across the eastern Caribbean Sea.

Photos shared online showed clouded skies above the eastern Caribbean island of St Barthelemy on Sunday, which had clear skies 24 hours prior.

NASA said the plume was “tremendous”, with new satellite images showing the dust cloud above the Atlantic Ocean.

“Normally, hundreds of millions of tons of dust are picked up from the deserts of Africa and blown across the Atlantic Ocean each year,” explained NASA last week. “That dust helps build beaches in the Caribbean and fertilizes soils in the Amazon. It can also affect air quality in North and South America.”