You remember all that sand the other day? Well I got my nice slate grey new patio swept to get rid of it, now after a short shower yesterday, its back again. Now this could have just washed off roofs and walls I suppose unless there was a lot more up high that has been washed out by the rain. Brian
Here in SE Essex my blue car turned red a week or so ago*. I washed it all off plus cleaning the windows and window sills on the house.
As you have observed the rain last night has deposited more red sand on my car, but this time possibly about a tenth of the level before.
*I noted when visiting the local supermarket possibly an hour after the rain that deposited the original sand had stopped that only around 50% of the cars had the red sand. Probably localised light rain in my area.
Are you sure it is saharan sand?
Right now my car is covered with pine tree pollen as all the evergreen firs and junipers are showering airborne pollen into the air. Rather they were yesterday when it was warm and sunny. Traces of snow today!
How can they be so sure where it comes from though? Surely sand is sand, at least of the desert kind. Brian
Well it was gritty, and people said it was sand, but I cannot see the colour. Brian
It is the nearest place with enough dry sand to do this and strong enough winds to get it up into the clouds. There is only a very narrow bit above the high tide mark and a few sand dunes around the UK coast.
You can have local wind borne sand land on cars in for example Southport or parts of the Northumberland coats.
It's definitely yellow.
It's more reddish here in Reigate - we're nearer the Sahara than you Charles! :)
Actually sand has many different types, as any geologist will point out.
The Sahara stuff seems to be a very fine powder and nothing like the sand you would use for making mortar or filling a play pit.
Andrew
It's more like a foxy-red colour on my car and window cills.
Its definitely orange
On 31 Mar 2022, Andrew wrote
I recall reading in the late 1970s about a guy who had built some golf courses in the Gulf States, and was particularly pleased to be able to say that he'd "sold sand to Abu Dhabi".
Makes obvious sense after a half-second's thought - the local sand wouldn't have been remotely suitable -- but it raised a smile.
The other point about the Sahara sand that reaches us is that it is very fine (which is why it will carry so far). There is a very large area of land producing it, in contrast to European coastline. They have strong dry winds too, which will help to create it. UK sourced stuff may come straight down with the rain and get washed into the drains.
We have an elderly aunt living in southern Spain. She told us that it was very heavy there and following a rain storm it turned into a horrendous mud. Thankfully she is pretty stoic.
Sand cannot be stupid, it has no brain. With respect, the neighbour said it was more reddy orange, so I guess it depends where you were. Brian
Or colour blind?
Brian
No but try some sunglasses. I was red green colour blind when I was young and had some sight to be blind with. It meant that under some lighting conditions, it was hard to read the colours on resistors. Brian
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