Beijing, 4 Apr (ZXS) -- Recently, strong sandstorms occurred in many places in China, and PM11 "exploded" in many northern cities. Since the beginning of this year, China has experienced the eighth sand and dust weather, has China entered an active period of sand and dust?
On April 4, the influence of the northeast cold vortex continued, and most of Liaoning will still have strong winds accompanied by sand and floating dust, and the temperature will drop by 11 to 6 degrees, which is expected to gradually end at night. The picture shows Shenyang citizens traveling in dusty weather. Photo by Yu Haiyang
On the 11th, Gui Hailin, chief forecaster of the Central Meteorological Observatory, was interviewed by reporters to interpret the situation related to sand and dust weather.
Gui Hailin said that since the 9th, China's sandstorm weather process has reached the level of sandstorm, which is the second sandstorm process this year. The sand and dust weather process has a large impact area, and sandstorms have occurred in many places in China. Monitoring shows that sandstorms have occurred successively in southern and eastern Xinjiang, central and western Inner Mongolia, central and western Gansu, Ningxia, north-central Shaanxi, Shanxi, Hebei, Beijing, Tianjin, northern Shandong, northern Henan, central Jilin, and north-central Liaoning, among which sandstorms occurred in Hohhot, Bayannur, Alxa, Datong, Beijing and other places in Inner Mongolia, and strong sandstorms occurred in Xilin Gol, Baotou, Ulanqab and Zhangjiakou, Hebei. The peak concentration of PM10 in many places in the north exceeds 2000 micrograms per cubic meter.
On the 11th, as the cold air moved eastward to the south, the dust weather continued to advance south. Environmental monitoring shows that the PM10 concentration area spreads to the south as a whole, and the PM10 concentration in southern Henan and southern Shandong exceeds 500 micrograms per cubic meter.
Gui Hailin said that as of 11 a.m. on the 7th, the impact area of this round of dust weather in China has reached more than 360.390 million square kilometers, and as the cold air continues to move south, it is expected that the impact area of this round of dust weather in China will reach 400.<> to <> million square kilometers.
Since 2018, the total average number of sand and dust storms in northern China has been higher than the average value from 2013 to 2017, showing a slight increase.
Gui Hailin said that from the perspective of sand and dust sources, this round of sand and dust weather is the joint effect of Mongolia and China's sand and dust source areas, and Mongolian cyclones bring strong winds to carry sand and dust south. Due to the geographical location of northern China, affected by the combined influence of surface conditions and weather systems, basically from March to May every year, it is the high season of sand and dust weather in China, which is actually a normal phenomenon.
"As for whether to enter the active period of sand and dust, it needs to be looked at from a larger time scale. Since 2000, the number of large-scale sand and dust in China has been decreasing or decreasing overall, but in recent years, especially in some years, the number of sand and dust is slightly more than the same period of the year, which is related to many factors, such as surface vegetation, precipitation, temperature, snow cover, and the intensity of the weather system, etc., these factors will have inter-annual changes. Therefore, on the whole, from the current situation, it cannot be judged that China has entered a new active cycle of sand and dust. ”
The Central Meteorological Observatory predicts that later this month, there will also be sand and dust weather affecting China, from the 13th to the 16th, the northwest region and North China and other places are still sandy and dusty, of which, from the night of the 13th to the 14th, the sand and dust weather may again affect Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and other places.
Gui Hailin said that sandstorms usually bring some impact on transportation, agriculture and animal husbandry and human health, for example, dust particles will carry some heavy metals or sensitive sources along the way, so people with cardiovascular or allergic constitution should go out as little as possible during the sand and dust, or go out to do a good job of protective measures, such as wearing masks, scarves, etc. In addition, sand and dust are usually accompanied by windy weather, need to pay attention to the reinforcement of outdoor structures or billboards, outdoor high-altitude work should strengthen personal safety protection, pedestrians as far away as possible from high-rise buildings, to avoid being hit by blowing objects. For agriculture and animal husbandry, sand and dust will cause wind erosion and desertification of the land, and the protection of farmland should be strengthened. (End)