One of the significant natural pollutants in the atmosphere is the mineral dust aerosols. In the northern hemisphere, Arabian Peninsula is one of the significant sources of dust aerosols with the frequency of dust storms changing seasonally. Dust emitted from the Arabian Peninsula region transports towards the Indian region through prevailing winds, therefore a positive correlation between the extreme dust episodes over the Arabian region and air quality over the Indian region is generally observed. Therefore, there is a need to monitor and forecast such an episodic event over the Arabian Peninsula and surrounding regions so that substantial measures may be taken in Indian subcontinent to mitigate the adverse impact of low air quality on human being and several other sectors such as aviation, energy and infrastructure. In the present study, the WRF-Chem simulations for dust particles are assessed against the observational data sets (i.e. MERRA-2, MODIS-Terra, Aura-OMI, CPCB). Based on the comparison of WRF-Chem simulated data sets with the satellite/reanalysis data, it is noted that in the post-monsoon season, WRF-Chem model can capture the entire dust episode (emission, transportation and dissipation) reasonably well. From the statistical analysis (PDF, CDF, Scatter plot and Temporal evolution), it was noted that there was a consistent underestimation of the simulated dust by WRF-Chem as compared to the observational data sets. A statistically robust categorical analysis has also been carried out for assessing the performance of WRF-Chem with respect to the observations for each dust event, and it is noted that on an average the probability of detection of dust event is about 77% and false alarm ratio is about 15% with an overall accuracy of 76%. Results obtained from the present analysis are encouraging and would be useful for the assessment of WRF-Chem simulations for other seasons also.

大气中的重要自然污染物之一是矿物粉尘气溶胶。在北半球，阿拉伯半岛是沙尘气溶胶的重要来源之一，沙尘暴的频率随季节变化。从阿拉伯半岛地区散发出的灰尘通过盛行的风向印度地区输送，因此，通常观察到阿拉伯地区的极端沙尘发作与印度地区的空气质量之间呈正相关。因此，有必要监测和预测阿拉伯半岛及其周围地区的这种偶发事件，以便在印度次大陆上采取实质性措施，以减轻低空气质量对人类和航空等其他部门的不利影响，能源和基础设施。在目前的研究中，根据观测数据集（即MERRA-2，MODIS-Terra，Aura-OMI，CPCB）评估了尘粒的WRF-Chem模拟。根据WRF-Chem模拟数据集与卫星/再分析数据的比较，可以注意到，在季风后季节，WRF-Chem模型可以较好地捕获整个尘埃事件（排放，运输和消散）。从统计分析（PDF，CDF，散点图和时间演变）中，注意到与观察数据集相比，WRF-Chem对模拟尘埃的估计值始终被低估。还针对每个尘埃事件的观测进行了统计上可靠的分类分析，以评估WRF-Chem的性能，并且应注意，平均检测到尘埃事件的概率约为77％，错误警报率约为15％，总准确度为76％。从当前分析中获得的结果令人鼓舞，对于其他季节的WRF-Chem模拟评估也将是有用的。