On the 22nd of September 2009 Sydneysiders woke to the largest dust storm the city had ever recorded, coined the “Red Dawn”, with dust coating the harbour bridge originating from the southern Lake Eyre Basin, South Australia and western and central New South Wales. The 3,000km long dust plume carried approximately 2.5 million tonnes of sediment off Australia and onto the Tasman Sea – the biggest loss of topsoil recorded in Australian history.

Image: Satellite imagery of the dust storm going over the Tasman Sea. Source: Marine and Freshwater Research.