A dust storm known as a “haboob” rolls into downtown Phoenix on Tuesday night, July 5, 2011, bringing strong winds and low visibility. (AP Photo/Amanda Lee Myers)

“Dust storms often lead to chain collisions because of the sudden and blinding nature of this weather phenomenon.”

Blowing dust will remain a problem in some communities of the Southwest over the next several days as daily rounds of thunderstorms develop.

Moisture being pulled in from the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean will keep fueling hit-or-miss afternoon thunderstorms across the bone-dry Four Corners region with the help of daytime heating.

Dust storms often occur with strong outflow from thunderstorms. The strong outflow is produced when a thunderstorm downburst, which occurs when the core of a thunderstorm collapses, suddenly forces air and water toward the ground. The fast-moving air has nowhere to go, but spread out in all directions.

Motorists should be prepared for suddenly reduced visibility in blowing dust over the next several days. At times, the visibility could fall below a quarter of a mile.

Dust dangerously shrouded the visibility in many areas of the Southwest on Saturday, including Mesa, Ariz., and Albuquerque, N.M.

Late Saturday, the Phoenix area endured blowing dust again along an outflow boundary of a thunderstorm. Dust reduced the visibility to 2 miles as the wind gusted to 36 mph. While the outflow boundary moved through Phoenix, causing the dust to blow around, the temperature dropped 10 degrees in an hour.

Afterward, only a trace of rain made it into Phoenix once a diminishing thunderstorm arrived.

The blowing dust in Phoenix on Saturday paled in comparison to the historic dust storm that hit the city on Tuesday. AccuWeather.com Meteorologist Heather Buchman covered the details of the extreme dust storm, or haboob, that struck Phoenix last week.

Safety Tips for Motorists Caught in Blowing Dust

Dust storms often lead to chain collisions because of the sudden and blinding nature of this weather phenomenon. However, there are safety tips you can follow to help avoid dangerous accidents and pileups.

Dust Storm Safety Tips from the NWS:

-Avoid dust storm area if you can.

-If dense dust is observed blowing across or approaching a roadway, pull your vehicle off the pavement as far as possible and come to a stop. Then, turn the vehicle’s light off, pull the emergency break, and take your foot off of the break pedal to be sure tail lights are not illuminated.

-If there is no option of pulling off the roadway, slow down to a speed suitable for the visibility and turn your lights on. It is also a good idea to sound your horn occasionally. Use the painted lines of the roadway to help guide you. Look for a safe place to pull off the roadway.

It may seem counter intuitive at first to turn a vehicle’s lights off when you pull off a roadway, but there is a good reason for following this safety tip. Vehicles approaching from behind may try to use the lights of vehicles ahead of them as a guide. If a car is pulled off the roadway with its lights on, then other vehicles may leave the roadway and possibly even crash into parked ones.

It is important to remember it only takes wind gusts of 30 mph to cause dangerous driving conditions with blowing dust and sand.