The sky became pale yellow in Beijing on Sunday as the air was full of floating dust blown by winds from the northwestern part of the country.

Towering buildings in the city proper are hazed by floating dust, as the first "yellow dust" storm of this year shrouds the urban areas after northerly wind blew in sand from drought-hit northern China exacerbating the yellowish sky, in Beijing, March 15, 2009. The sand came from Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Gansu and Qinghai provinces, where sandstorms raged earlier this week after prolonged drought, according to the Central Meteorological Bureau. [Wang Huaigui/Xinhua]

This was the third dusty day Beijing has experienced this Spring.

A sandstorm hit parts of Gansu and Inner Mongolia in the northwest on Friday, with winds of around 60 km per hour and a visibility of only 300 meters in Minqin of Gansu.

The floating dust came to Beijing's northwestern Yanqing district at around 6 a.m. Sunday and began to affect the downtown area at midday, said Wang Xiaoming, a Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau official.

It was unclear whether the dusty weather would end on Monday, said Wang.