Rare Orange Snow Turns Eastern Europe Into 'Mars'

Dust from a sandstorm in the Sahara Desert in Northern Africa created orange snow, which was observed in the Eastern European countries of Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, and Russia.

"The unusual scenes are believed to be created by a mix of sand, dust and pollen particles stirred up and swept across from storms in northern Africa. According to the meteorologists, the phenomenon occurs roughly every five years," The Guardian article stated.

"As the sand gets lifted to the upper levels of the atmosphere, it gets distributed elsewhere," said Steven Keates, a weather forecaster at the UK’s Met Office. "Looking at satellite imagery from Nasa, it shows a lot of sand and dust in the atmosphere drifting across the Mediterranean."

The Guardian story features a video as well as Instagram and Twitter photos of the orange snow that cover the earth, snapped by skiers and snowboarders.

A Tweeter wrote, “Martian landscape, Apocalypse Now.”

Another added, “Snowy slopes were transformed into barkhan dunes.”