Australia, the land downunder
A recent image sent to me by 'no-one', a dust storm rolling across a part of Western Australia.
the photo was taken by an un-named nurse living and /or working in the area at the time
Most of our 'outback' areas have this deep orange/red soil, which doesn't readily grow crops or even grass.
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The dust storm is strangely beautiful and definitely ominous. How can people and animals breathe when it arrives?
ReplyDeleteTerra; there's usually fair warning, so people go inside and seal off doors and windows. If they need to be outside they wear a bandanna mask over mouth and nose. Dogs and cats would be inside too.
DeleteIt looks liek something out of a movie. Fabulous.
ReplyDeleteUglemor; it reminds me of the dust storm in the movie The Mummy and a similar dust storm in the movie Stargate.
DeleteOppressive heat, droughts, deadly animals, there is a reason Aussies are tough. I know it is a beautiful country (my son visited and was in love with the it) but apparently that beauty comes with hazards.
ReplyDeleteThe dust storm is spectacular...as long as you only experience it in a photo.
joeh; it is impressive, the country and the dust storm, and every country has its hazards, blizzards for the northern hemisphere, for example. I've lived in the mid-north and far north of my state, South Australia and have experienced a few such storms, but never of this magnitude. I can say with certainty that if one of these is on the way, housewives in the area rush to get their washing off the clotheslines before it hits, otherwise everything has to get washed again.
DeleteWow, that dust storm is both scary and beautiful. Sure glad we don't have them--yet.
ReplyDeleteArkansas Patti; I don't know that you would ever get any like this, only in the desert areas and you don't have the red dust which is very fine textured and gets into every little chink.
DeleteMy brain thinks that picture is beautiful, but my lungs beg to differ.
ReplyDeleteVal; your brain and lungs are both correct.
DeleteSpectacular and somewhat like the dust storm that rolled into Melbourne in the early 80s. It was like a wall moving towards the city. Inside and out, everything was covered in red dust.
ReplyDeleteAndrew; yes, I vaguely remember it, we lived in Melbourne twice in the 80s. Mostly the red dust is in the outback, but depending on the size of the storm the cities will also suffer.
DeleteBack in the day when I in lived in Australia - Melbourne - I remember that 80s dust storm well. Was driving in the car and started coughing and the eyes were getting sore. Very freaky.
DeleteAlong These Lines; welcome to drifting. I hope you pulled over until you could drive safely.
DeleteWow that is some storm and so red also. I wonder as another commenter did how it must get into the lungs and into clothes, etc. Not to mention housekeeping.
ReplyDeleteXO
WWW
WWW; housekeeping after one of these storms is a matter of washing everything down for the next few days, unless you've managed to seal off the interior of your house. It's one reason why very early homesteaders built porches to surround the entire house, then screened them with fine wire screens.
DeleteHow difficult to live with, or in. I wonder what the people do for their living.
ReplyDeleteJoanne; I'm not sure what kind of living is in the north end of Western Australia, probably some mining, maybe a sheep or cattle station. I know that in the north of South Australia there are sheep and cattle stations, but there's certainly no farming, the soil doesn't grow edible crops. There are saltbushes and spinifex, it's a very unforgiving area. Living there would be hard to those of us used to city life. Getting supplies and mail means relying on 'road trains' I would think. Not many people do live out there as far as I know.
DeleteIt's amazing the dust storms and that is a lovely capture of one of them. We often had dust haze in our trip in winter.
ReplyDeleteMargaret-whiteangel; I remember seeing a distant red dust storm covering the enormous moon as it rose from the horizon, way back in the late 60s when I spent a few months living on a sheep station.
DeleteDorothea Mackellar described our country so well in her 1904 poem..."My Country"....her description of our varying landscape, our various characteristics, weather patterns etc., back then still applies to this day.
ReplyDeleteLee; she did describe it so perfectly. I've never read the entire poem, unless we did at school and I just don't remember. But the first few lines are enough.
DeleteWow! That's an amazing picture. Beautiful to look at, but it must be absolutely miserable to experience.
ReplyDeleteSusan; amazing to watch from a distance, like on the TV news, but it is miserable to go through. Thankfully where I live we don't get too many. I can only recall two and one was in another state, the other in the small town I grew up in.
DeleteThe dust storms in the deserts of our southwest are called "haboobs", a rather silly name for a dangerous phenomenon. This looks like something i'd want to watch at a safe distance.
ReplyDeletemessymimi; haboobs? that would be something to laugh at, takes the edge off the danger a bit when you can laugh at it.
DeleteWow. The colours are amazing!
ReplyDeleteThe Happy Whisk; that's Australia :)
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