Dust storm set to sweep through Beijing a day after smog

Beijing is set to be hit by a dust storm today just 24 hours after being enveloped by smog, marking its second encounter with a combination of two different types of air pollution in less than two weeks.

Residents of the capital, who had been expecting smog to ease considerably with the spring fall in humidity levels, instead woke up to hazardous smog yesterday morning, with the US embassy air quality readings showing the level of PM2.5, respirable suspended particles, exceeding 300 micrograms per cubic metre.

The worst pollution occurred around noon with the index, published hourly on the embassy's Twitter feed, showing 410ppm at 2pm. More than 80 per cent of the Beijing municipal government's monitoring stations reported very unhealthy air quality indices of over 300.

Some residents who had removed their face masks in the afternoon to make breathing easier as a wind began to blow, very soon received a warning from the municipal weather authorities that dust and sand would arrive today with winds strong enough to blow off billboards.

Most of the dust and sand will have originated from the Gobi Desert in Inner Mongolia.