Dust Uplift Potential in the Central Sahel: An Analysis Based on 10 years of Meteorological Measurements at High Temporal Resolution

Abstract

AbstractA 10 year data set of wind speed and precipitation recorded in two Sahelian stations located in Niger and Mali is used to investigate the duration and the diurnal and seasonal cycles of high wind speeds and Dust Uplift Potential (DUP). The results indicate that high wind speeds, those greater than the threshold wind velocity required to initiate wind erosion (TWV) over a bare soil occurred in the middle and late morning during the dry and wet seasons but also at nighttime during the wet season. However, the morning wind speeds are only slightly greater than TWV leading to low DUP. On the opposite, the high wind velocities associated to the nocturnal mesoscale convective systems crossing the Sahel during the wet season are responsible for the highest potential wind erosion events. This leads to a strong seasonality of DUP with more than 70% occurring in less than 90 days, from mid‐April to mid‐July. The duration of the high wind speed events is very short since more than 80% last for less than 3 h, suggesting that the frequency of the observations performed in SYNOP meteorological stations is not sufficient to correctly quantify the contribution of such events to DUP. Finally, by combining precipitation and DUP, we estimated that precipitation should have a relatively limited role in terms of inhibition of wind erosion in this region with precipitation only affecting 25% of total DUP.