Black Sunday (storm)

[3] On the afternoon of April 14, residents of several plains states were forced to take cover as a dust storm or "black blizzard" blew through the region.

[1] Drought, erosion, bare soil, and winds caused the dust to fly freely and at high speeds.

[4] It now describes the area in the United States most affected by the storms, including western Kansas, eastern Colorado, northeastern New Mexico, and the Oklahoma and Texas panhandles.

By 1934, they had reached the Great Plains, stretching from North Dakota to Texas and from the Mississippi River Valley to the Rocky Mountains.

[6] A drought hit the United States in the 1930s,[5] and the lack of rainfall, snowfall, and moisture in the air dried out the topsoil in most of the country's farming regions.

[6] Poor migrants from the American Southwest (known as "Okies" - though only about 20 percent were from Oklahoma) flooded California, overtaxing the state's health and employment infrastructure.

The smaller birds fly until they are exhausted, then fall to the ground, to share the fate of the thousands of jack rabbits which perish from suffocation.

Woody Guthrie, a singer-songwriter from Oklahoma, wrote a variety of songs documenting his experiences living during the era of dust storms.

You could see that dust storm comin', the cloud looked deathlike black, And through our mighty nation, it left a dreadful track.