I have heard of this horrible phenomena.

I have also heard that it arrives in late Summer months, is that true ?

We will be back in Lanz late August/September.

have had them already this year

Calima´s are bad.
All it is is that sand is picked up from the Sahara (also locusts) and deposited on Lanzarote. The whole place seems to go brown, even the air. It´s a weird feeling but fine. My girlfriend landed in a Calima and said she couldn´t see anything until nearly on the runway but also was the steadiest landing she´d ever had!
Don´t worry about them.

Doesn't the temperature rise rather rapidly though ?

I experienced it just once, on my last day once.
I walked outside and it hit me, it’s a bit like that hot draft you get when you walk in some older large stores except it doesn’t go away when you walk 2 yards. I couldn’t work out where the hot draft was coming from I looked around expecting an air con outlet or something, it took me a while to realise that it was just the outside air.
Thoroughly unpleasant actually and leaves a right mess behind, given the choice I’d prefer rain.
Ole

calimas occur regularly year round and overall id say they are a good thing for tourists as they mean its good weather.only twice in 7 years have they bought over the locusts,but they do invoke ear eye and nose problems in a few people

Is there a Calima occuring now ?

I have a friend who lives on Fuerte, he says the dust is all over the place at the moment.

yes thats a calima but you should embrace it not worry about it

My friend is having to use eye drops at the moment and says that many others have to do as well.

I'd rather not experience calima, in the same way , I don't like it when the locusts drop out of the sky either.

Ugly beggars they are !

Locusts don't appear very often in Lanzarote - A calima has to coincide with a Desert Locust Plague, which only happens 7 or 8 times per century.

I was there in March 1993 when the locusts arrived.It was the very same time as the IRA bomb in Warrington that killed some children. I missed the big locust plague on Lanz about 4 years ago IIRC.

Think there is a bit of misinformation going on....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saharan_Air_Layer

The calima is not an annual event like monsoon season - nor is it remotely life threatening or something.

Every so often you will feel the wind coming off Africa rather than the atlantic, its like a hairdryer on max heat and you may get a couple of super hot days.

But its nothing to worry about - certainly wouldn't read to much into it at all.

Lanzarote has suffered a number of Calimas in the last year.
Yes, it gets extremely hot and the sand in the air turns everything brown. The sky, the cars, roads etc.
It is not particularly life threatening unless of course you suffer from respiritory diseases. This is bad then due to the grains in the atmosphere.
For 99% of people it is just uncomfortable.
Wikipedia needs updating!

Wikipedia is not a definitive answer - just more of a guide!! You can update it yourself cymmon!

It´s guiding people into getting wrong info.