A towering wall of dust, known meteorologically as a haboob, swallowed parts of metro Phoenix Monday evening, plunging the city into near-zero visibility.
The dust storm was quickly followed by severe thunderstorms that tore through the city, leaving behind downed trees, wind damage and widespread power outages. At Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport, a connector bridge was shredded by 70 mph wind gusts.
The National Weather Service in Phoenix issued both dust storm and severe thunderstorm warnings as the system pushed into Maricopa County Monday evening. The weather service warned drivers of dangerously low visibility and urged people to “pull aside stay alive.”
The Arizona Department of Transportation echoed that warning, saying there was significantly reduced visibility on I-10 and I-17 due to the dust storm and flooding on roadways, urging drivers to proceed with caution.
After the storms swept through, more than 60,000 customers in Arizona were left without power, with the majority of outages concentrated in Maricopa County, according to PowerOutage.us.
