Arable land can have a negative impact on a...(nditions were wrong the wind was coming...)

Satellite pictures solve the riddle

The directive on particulate matter has been in force in the European Union since 2005. As a consequence, there is a comprehensive air monitoring network in the member states designed to monitor compliance with the limit values. With quick, unbureaucratic assistance from a total of 15 state environmental agencies it was possible to analyse particulate data from 360 stations in five countries. It quickly became apparent that the particulate matter was coming from the east because the concentration increased noticeably towards Slovakia. But where exactly had the cloud come from" What the situation was like the other side of the EUs eastern border was a matter for speculation because of a lack of air monitoring data. So the researchers combed satellite pictures and came across what they were looking for on a EUMETSAT picture. This showed a noticeable red patch over southern Ukraine on 23 March which expanded rapidly. The researchers estimated the total mass of the dust cloud to be at least 60,000 tons. That is equivalent to more than 600 wagonloads of sand. The actual mass was probably much greater still, since the measuring devices register only those particles that are smaller than 10 microns (0.01 mm). Czech geologists estimated the total dust load must be about 3 million tons because this Ukrainian "plume" contained also bigger particles till size of 0.5mm. The last remaining doubts about the origin of the dust cloud were cleared up by a team led by Dr Jindrich Hladil at the Institute of Geology of the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague. They compared the dust samples from the air with dust samples taken directly from the Ukrainian soil. The lead isotope ratio showed that the dust had indeed come from the Black Sea region. The mineralogical-petrological fingerprinting of the sol
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