The
Bodélé Depression (also
Bodele), located at the southern edge of the
Sahara Desert in north central
Africa, is the lowest point in
Chad.
Dust storms from the Bodélé Depression occur on average about 100 days per year, one typical example being the massive dust storms that swept over
West Africa and the
Cape Verde Islands in February 2004. As the wind sweeps between the
Tibesti and the
Ennedi Mountains in Northern
Chad, it is channeled across the depression. The dry bowl that forms the depression is marked by a series of
ephemeral lakes, many of which were last filled during wetter periods of the
Holocene.