Newsademic British English edition 260

particles, or atoms, into space. This 
is called a solar storm.
Artist’s impression of a solar storm hitting Mars (NASA)
About eight months ago, MA- 
VEN recorded a solar storm hitting 
Mars. Then, the atmosphere loss 
was between ten and 20 times high­
er. Scientists believe that the Sun’s 
‘space w eather’ was much more 
violent soon after the Solar System 
formed. Therefore most o f M ars’ at­
mosphere was probably lost billions 
o f years ago. □

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12th November 2015 
N e w s a d e m ic .co m ™
 - British English edition 
page 
10
F
l o w e r in g
 
desert
Many local people and tourists 
have been travelling to the Ata­
cama Desert. There, they have 
been looking at an unusual phe­
nomenon. Called a flowering de­
sert, it normally occurs once every 
five to seven years. Yet this year, 
the Atacama has ‘flowered’ twice. 
This has never been known to 
happen before.
The Atacama Desert is a high 
plateau. It is between two mountain 
ranges. The Andes Mountains are 
to the west and the Chilean Coast 
Range to the east. These mountain 
ranges run parallel to each other. 
This creates a ‘double rain shad­
ow ’. A rain shadow is a dry area on 
one side of a mountain range. The 
shadow is on the opposite side to the 
one facing oncoming, or prevailing, 
winds. Forced to rise by the moun­
tains, moisture in the air precipi­
tates, or becomes rain. This imme­
diately falls. The air that then passes 
to the other side of the mountain is 
very dry. It is therefore unlikely to 
produce any rain.
Atacam a Desert, in Chile (Valerio Pillar)
M ost of the Atacama Desert is in 
Chile, although its northern bound­
ary is inside Peru. The desert is one 
o f the w orld’s driest places. On av­
erage there is about 15 millimetres 
(0.6 inches) o f rain per year. How­
ever, in some areas of the Atacama 
there has been no rain for over four 
years. It is not hot like the Sahara
Desert, in Africa. This is because 
most o f the plateau is around 4,000 
metres (13,100 feet) above sea lev­
el. Therefore the Atacama is w hat’s 
known as a cold desert.
Many of the biggest telescopes 
(or astronomical observatories) in 
the world are in the Atacama De­
sert. The Earth’s most powerful 
telescope is currently being built on 
the top of a Chilean Coast Range 
mountain. Called the European Ex­
tremely Large Telescope (E-ELT), it 
will take ten years to complete. The 
Atacama Desert is one o f the w orld’s 
best places for telescopes. This is 
because it is high, there is very little 
moisture in the air, and almost every 
day and night is cloudless.
The flowering desert occurs 
when there has been far more rain­
fall than usual. It normally happens 
between the months of September 
and November. The flowering de­
sert is connected with w hat’s called 
an El Nino, or El Nino event. It’s 
known that sea temperatures in the 
Pacific Ocean off the north east 
coast o f South America can change 
dramatically. W hen this part o f the 
Pacific starts to get much warmer, it 
is usually a sign of an El Nino. N o­
body knows what causes these big 
sea temperature changes in this part 
o f the world. On average they occur 
every five years. Scientists say that 
a strong El Nino is happening now.
An El Nino usually affects the 
weather on both sides of the Pa­
cific Ocean and in other parts of 
the world. During an El Nino there 
is much more rain in the northern