© COURTESY OF MIKE OLBINSKIA fast moving haboob approaches storm chasers in Arizona.
Arizonans not only dealt with dust but also hurricane-force wind gusts, hail and torrential rain.
"It was one of those days where we had just about everything," said Brandon Wright, a meteorologist and weather producer at the Weather Channel in Atlanta. "There was hail, wind, flooding and blowing dust. That's about as severe as it gets out there."
Shortly after 4 p.m., monsoonal storms fired along the Mogollon Rim in the Tonto National Forest of Central Arizona. The line raced west, snarling traffic in the Phoenix metro just in time for the afternoon commute. As cool outflow surged ahead of the encroaching storms, strong winds kicked up a curtain of dust high into the sky. Before long, severe thunderstorm warnings were hoisted as the city was plunged into a menacing mass of rain, lightning and burnt-red soil.
Comment: Last November an unseasonably late haboob dust storm hit Phoenix, Arizona. In May powerful 'freak' dust storms killed over 125 people in north India, the highest death toll in decades. Last month an epic dust storm completely engulfed Mars.
See also: Cosmic climate change: Is the cause of all this extreme weather to be found in outer space?