Global distribution of aerosols, satellite image. Different satellite observations were combined to produce this visualisation of solid particles and liquid droplets (aerosols) in the Earth's atmosphere on 23 August 2018. Huge plumes of smoke drifted over North America and Africa, three different tropical cyclones churned in the Pacific Ocean, and large clouds of dust blew over deserts in Africa and Asia. The storms are visible within giant swirls of sea salt aerosol (blue) from sea spray. Black carbon particles (red) are among the particles emitted by fires; vehicle and factory emissions are another common source. Particles the model classified as dust are shown in purple. Image from the the Goddard Earth Observing System Forward Processing (GEOS FP), using data from the Terra, Aqua, Aura and Suomi NPP satellites.