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Journalism of Courage
Dust from a sandstorm in the Sahara desert is causing snow in eastern Europe to turn orange, transforming the mountainous regions of Ukraine, Russia, Bulgaria and Romania into Mars-like landscapes. The unusual scenes were believed to be created by a mix of sand, dust and pollen particles stirred up and swept across from storms in northern Africa, the Guardian reported.
Photos of these orange snowy landscapes have captured the imagination of people, and they have been sharing images on social media, expressing their bafflement. UK’s Met Office tweeted, “Orange snow has been reported in eastern Europe and Russia. Saharan storms brought sand and dust across the Mediterranean, which mixed with the snow. This also turned skies an eerie shade of red across Cyprus”.
According to meteorologists, the phenomenon occurs roughly every five years. Steven Keates, a weather forecaster at the UK’s Met Office, told the Independent: “As the sand gets lifted to the upper levels of the atmosphere, it gets distributed elsewhere. “Looking at satellite imagery from NASA, it shows a lot of sand and dust in the atmosphere drifting across the Mediterranean.”
Skiers and snowboarders posted photographs on Instagram and Twitter that gives a glimpse of the Mars-like surface in eastern Europe.
It is not the first time eastern Europeans have experienced an eerie snow-tint, reports the Guardian. A similar phenomenon occurred in 2007 when mysterious “oily” orange snow fell across three regions of southern Siberia.
