Yellow Dust Linked to Weather Change
From Reuters:
Jeff Stith of the National Center for Atmospheric Research communicated with reporters via Web chat from a research jet flying 40,000 feet above the ocean as part of a mission to track dust and pollution particles blown from Asia to the United States.
“We have found enhancements in pollution levels in some of the upper regions of the storm clouds we studied, just yesterday for example,” Stith wrote.
Stith and his ground-based colleague, V. Ramanathan of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, aimed to study the interaction between the pollution and dust with high-altitude clouds bearing ice crystals.
Ice crystals are found in extremely cold clouds, and when the crystals are composed entirely of frozen water, they reflect lots of sunlight — that’s why these clouds look so white, Ramanathan said by telephone after the Web chat.
However, if particles of dust and a dark pollutant known as black carbon managed to get inside the crystals, these clouds might absorb more solar energy rather than reflecting it all, Ramanathan said.
You can see interviews with the two scientists here and here, but they say the significance of this dust mixed with Asian pollution blowing across the Pacific, is that they believe it effects weather patterns by influencing precipitation levels once the clouds reach the US. They also believe the dust and pollution is possible for anywhere from 20%-80% of global warming.
Here is computer enhanced image of the dust and pollution crossing the ocean from the PACDEX website:
 
It seems like the dust has been getting worse nearly every year, maybe some of you Korea old-timers can verify if the dust was as bad 20-30 years ago as it is now. It will be interesting to see what the scientists findings are once they complete their research.
I've been here most of the time since 1983 and the dust has gotten much worse. Until about 5 years ago Spring only met nice weather. Now it means more dust and for a longer period of time each year. I never had alergys until about 3-4 years ago and they only come with the dust not the pollen.
I have been here 11 years in pusan and daegu…the frequency is irratic but the severity is definately increasing as witnessed by the April Fool's day storm this year that reached above 2000 in Daegu…
Check these pics out
[…] [GI Korea] Yellow Dust Linked Published: Wed, 16 May 2007 20:20:04 +0000 From Reuters: Jeff Stith of the National Center for Atmospheric Research communicated with reporters via Web chat from a research jet flying 40,000 feet above the ocean as part of a mission to track dust and pollution particles blown from Asia to the United States. "We have found enhancements in pollution levels in some of the upper […] Read More… […]
I have about eight years of experience with Korea and it does seem to be getting worse than in previous years. It is interesting to hear from someone who was in Korea in the 80's to confirm this suspicion.
Good articles. I had no knowledge of the problem here 30 years ago. I doubt if anyone noticed, if indeed it existed.
Mr. Joe, I have read a lot about the Korean War and not in one book can I remember any accounts of visibility problems during the spring time due to dust from the Gobi desert. The recent environmental damage in China must be overwhelmingly extensive to cause such dust storms that are wreaking havok over Korea today.
Yet what does Korean environmentalists care about? Fhlameldahyde dumped down a sink in Yongsan that was processed multiple times before reaching the already heavily polluted Han River.