How did sand from the Sahara affect life in the Czech Republic? It mainly bothered the sick, experts say

The effect on the air in the Czech Republic was that in Morocco and northern Algiers occurred in the past week sand storm. “These provided energy to raise the dust to greater heights, and the south wind blew it not only into Central Europe, but also over Scandinavia and North-Eastern Europe,” explained Milada Křížová from the Forecasting Service of the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute to Deník.

We wrote about the smog situation in the Czech Republic due to dust from the Sahara here:

The air in the Czech Republic was worsened by dust from the Sahara. There is a smog situation in part of the republic

Meteorologists because sand from the African Sahara therefore, they temporarily declared a smog situation. It affected people’s health little. “The concentration of sand from the Sahara was not high enough for us to cope with it thanks to the ciliated epithelium that we have on the mucous membranes,” epidemiologist Roman Prymula responded to Deník.

He explained that this meant that people had caught the sand on their mucous membranes. “And as the cilia move back, they coughed him. Unless one gets into some near-sandstorm, the problem shouldn’t be significantly dramatic,” he added.

Sahara sand in Prague:

However, if anyone was irritated by anything in the past few days, it was them small flying dust particles less than 10 or less than 2.5 micrometers. “Especially the smaller ones get into the bronchi or bronchioles. They can bother people who are very ill or are over sixty-five years old,” Vladimír Koblížek, head of the Pulmonary Clinic of the Hradec Králové University Hospital, explained to Deník.

He specified that problems could be felt by people with bronchial or lung diseases, as well as heart disease, pregnant women or small children. “All that was needed was for them to behave as if there was some November smog. So they moved outside less,” he added. Experts also called for this.

An unprecedented situation

According to Ondřej Vlček from Úsek air quality According to the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute, this was a higher concentration of airborne dust compared to the normal winter period. He pointed out that the Sahara sand was present in our country in the past, but not for so long and to such an extent. That is, throughout the territory of the republic.

Dust, which traveled all the way from the Sahara to the territory of the Czech Republic, affected the weather during the Easter weekend:

Africa is here: See how sand from the Sahara flew in the Czech Republic over the weekend

The current situation was unprecedented in this regard. “In the past, there were peaks of several hours, which then passed and affected a small part of the territory. What happened over the weekend was exceptional in that the concentrations were so high that smog situations were declared according to the applicable legislation,” he told Deník.

At the same time, according to him, Czech legislation is focused on a different type of situation, for example winter inversion. “She didn’t count on this a bit, but assumptions smog conditions were met,” he noted. This means that dust concentrations of 100 micrograms per cubic meter for a twelve-hour average were exceeded.

What is Saharan dust?

The second condition was also met. “So we didn’t expect a rapid decline within 24 hours,” he noted. It also did not happen, the situation lasted for approximately three days. Vlček added that there is currently no smog warning in effect. The last ones were canceled during this morning.