Study: Dust might dampen hurricane fury

MADISON, Wis., Oct. 10 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists say dust rising from the Sahara Desert and blowing off western Africa might affect Atlantic hurricane frequency and strength.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers, led by Amato Evan, a researcher at UW-Madison's Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies, researched satellite data from 1981-2006. They found that during periods of intense hurricane activity, dust was relatively scarce in the atmosphere. During years when stronger dust storms were more frequent, fewer hurricanes swept through the Atlantic.

"These findings are important because they show that long-term changes in hurricanes may be related to many different factors," said study co-author Jonathan Foley, director of UW-Madison's Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment. "While a great deal of work has focused on the links between (hurricanes) and warming ocean temperatures, this research adds another piece to the puzzle."

"What we don't know is whether the dust affects the hurricanes directly, or whether both (dust and hurricanes) are responding to the same large scale atmospheric changes around the tropical Atlantic," said Foley. "That's what future research needs to find out."

The study appears in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.