Bodélé Depression

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The Bodélé Depression (pronounced [bɔ.de.le]), located at the southern edge of the Sahara Desert in north central Africa, is the lowest point in Chad. It is 500 km long, 150 km wide and around 160 m deep. Its bottom lies about 155 meters above sea level. The dry endorheic basin is a major source of fertile dust essential for the Amazon rainforest, with some studies suggesting that it supplies over half of the nutrient-rich dust that supports the rainforest. Dust storms from the Bodélé Depression occur on average about 100 days per year, one typical example being the massive dust storms that swept over West Africa and the Cape Verde Islands in February 2004. As the wind sweeps between the Tibesti and the Ennedi Mountains in Northern Chad, it is channeled across the depression. The dry bowl that forms the depression is marked by a series of ephemeral lakes, many of which were last filled during wetter periods of the Holocene. Diatoms from these fresh water lakes, once part of the prehistoric...

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