Dry deposition of PM10 over the Yellow Sea during Asian dust events from 2001 to 2007

Dry deposition velocities and fluxes of PM10 during Asian dust events over the Yellow Sea from 2001 to 2007 were investigated using observation data in Qingdao, China and Jeju, Korea. The dry deposition velocities of PM10 during dust events over the Yellow Sea ranged from 0.19 to 8.17 cm/sec, with an average of 3.38 cm/sec. Dry deposition fluxes of PM10 during dust events over the Yellow Sea were in the range of 68.5–2647.1 mg/(m2·day), with an average of 545.4 mg/(m2·day), which is 2–10 times higher than those reported by other studies for both dust and non-dust periods. It was estimated that 2.6 × 1011–48.7 × 1011 g dust particles deposit to the Yellow Sea during dust events through dry deposition every year. Compared with the results in previous studies, it was found that the dry deposition of PM10 over the Yellow Sea during dust events in the years with high frequency of dust could account for a large or overwhelming fraction of the annual total dry deposition. Backward air mass trajectory analysis showed that dust events influenced Jeju mainly originated from the desert regions located in Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, China. There were 119 backward trajectories influenced both Qingdao and Jeju during 15 dust events from 2001 to 2007, accounting for 61.3% of the total trajectories of 194, indicating that Qingdao and Jeju were usually on the same pathway of dust transport downwind from source areas.