The interplay of mineral dust with radiation: analysis of the giant dust intrusion in the Atlantic Ocean on June 2020

Abstract In this work we analysed the radiative effects caused by a giant dust storm that transported desert dust from the western Sahara to the Caribbean regions in June 2020. For the reporting of this dust plume, we considered a multi-platform set of remote sensing data, from the sensors VIIRS, MODIS and SEVIRI that are onboard the NOAA-20, Aqua and Meteosat spacecrafts respectively. The analysis of aerosol-radiation effect is established by considering a regional simulation with the WRF-Chem model utilising the coupling between the aerosols of the GOCART speciation, and the radiative modules defined in WRF-Chem by the “New Goddard Shortwave and Longwave Schemes”. The dust radiative forcing (DRF) function provides a surface average cooling with maximum values around − 50 Wm− 2 that may be attributed to a reduction of SW radiation absorbed and scattered by dust particles. This study support the use of fully-coupled modelling approach, between aerosols and meteorology, in the context of regional-scale and in climate risk assessments