The Sahara sends the Amazon fertilizer by air.

Dust crosses the Atlantic and brings phosphorus to the rainforest.

Evidence object No. 004 / Streams of dust leave the desert. The black lines are the share — about 15% — that settles over the Amazon.

The part that checks out ↘

It really happened.

Each year, wind lifts about 182 million tons of dust off the Sahara and carries it west across the Atlantic. NASA’s CALIPSO satellite measured that roughly 27.7 million tons settles over the Amazon basin. It brings an estimated 22,000 tons of phosphorus — about the same amount the rainforest loses to rain and flooding.

Earth’s largest hot desert and its largest tropical rainforest look like opposites. Measured from orbit, they behave like one system.

No folklore. Actual sources.

1
NASA Satellite Reveals How Much Saharan Dust Feeds Amazon’s Plants
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center · 2015 · government Primary

182 Mt lifted, 27.7 Mt deposited over the Amazon, 22,000 t of phosphorus.

nasa.gov
2
The fertilizing role of African dust in the Amazon rainforest: A first multiyear assessment based on CALIPSO lidar observations
Geophysical Research Letters (Yu et al.) · 2015 · peer reviewed

The underlying study.

doi.org