Sandstorm engulfs northern China

Beijing, together with many regions in northern China, experienced a sandstorm on Monday.

The sandstorm is the strongest and the most sweeping one in nearly a decade, according to the National Meteorological Center.

Starting from Monday to 8 am Tuesday, affected by cold fronts and heavy winds, floating sand and dust are expected to sweep parts of Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning, Gansu, Ningxia, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Hebei, Beijing and Tianjin, forecast the center.

Some regions in Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Shaanxi and Shanxi will be hit by strong sandstorms, the center said. 

The center has advised the public to take precautions against the heavy winds and sandstorms, and suggested that drivers prepare for poor visibility.

Remote sensing images of dust in northern China show the dust from southern Mongolia gradually traveled south with the airflow.

Visibility remained low in Beijing as the municipal observatory issued a yellow alert.

The yellow alert, or the second-lowest level in the four-tier weather alert system (red, orange, yellow and blue from the most severe level to the least), was issued at 7:35 am by the Beijing Meteorological Service on Monday.

It said the sandstorm will continue during the day time and the visibility will be lower than 1,000 meters at the noon.

At 9 am Monday, the city's level of PM10 particles reached 8,108 micrograms per cubic meter at six major urban districts, with the city seeing heavy pollution.

The Beijing Capital International Airport canceled 247 flights and the Beijing Daxing International Airport 181 flights by 9:30 am Monday due to the sandstorm, according to the flight information app Hangban Guanjia.

The total planned inbound and outbound flights in the capital airport for today was 1,141, which means more than 20 percent of the flights have been canceled, data from the app showed, reported Jiemian.com, a local news portal.

For the Daxing airport, the total number of planed inbound and outbound flights for today was 846 and 21.39 percent of them have been canceled, it added.

记者：杜娟  马驰  李弘扬