A Robust Satellite Technique ( RST ) for detection and monitoring of dust storms

Several satellite techniques have been, up to now, proposed in order to monitor dust storms. Dust clouds contain large amounts of particles which can impact on climate representing a serious danger to human health and air transportation. In order to detect them, satellite-based methods usually consider the reverse absorption behaviour shown by silicate particles, in comparison with ice crystals and water droplets, at 11 and 12 µm (split windows) wavelengths. However, performances of split window methods depend on observational conditions (day/night, land/sea, etc.) as well as on specific aerosol properties (mainly size distribution and complex refractive index). Moreover, several satellite techniques are based on fixed thresholds and they often have difficulties in identifying sandstorms over daytime images as well as problems in discriminating meteorological from dust clouds. To overcome limitations of such methods, a new approach for satellite data analysis, named RST-DUST (Robust Satellite Technique for DUST detection), is here proposed and applied to recent dust stormevents.