3D Saharan Dust Variability Over Europe as Seen by CALIPSO

Dust is one of main aerosol types in the atmosphere and plays an important role in modulating climate via a number of complex processes. A 3D multi-year monthly mean climatology of Saharan dust advection over Europe is presented under cloud-free conditions, using an area-optimized pure dust CALIPSO product. The product has been developed by applying EARLINET-measured dust lidar ratios and depolarization-based dust discrimination methods. This approach results in a very good agreement when comparing CALIPSO AOD with AERONET retrievals over Europe/North Africa and with the MODIS/Aqua product over the Mediterranean. The processing of such purely observational data can provide seasonal patterns of pure Saharan dust transportation towards Europe and the Atlantic Ocean. The physical and optical properties of the dust layers are identified for several areas near the Saharan sources, over the Mediterranean and over continental Europe.