Definition of "qobar"

qobar

/ˌkoʊˈbɑːɹ/

noun
plural not attested
1. (rare) A dry fog or dry haze, chiefly of the upper Nile but rarely also elsewhere, which has a brownish-yellow color when slight (sometimes only perceptible from a distance) and darker yellow-grey color when thicker (sometimes obscuring the landscape and blotting out the stars).
  Quotations
  In Ethiopia, where it is called qobar, this haze is of extraordinary density and hides all the features of the landscape beyond the distance of a mile, and conceals stars of the third magnitude even in the zenith.
  1800, Report of the Board of Regents, volume 44, page 237
  Humboldt, viewing qobar in Peru, says […] . When travelling in Spain, Willkomm remarked qobar at a distance of 3 or 4 miles, yet, on reaching the actual spot, he saw nothing. [...] Bravais saw qobar on the Faulhorn, when his hygrometer was at 51, air saturated with moisture marking 100. In Ethiopia, where I have observed it so low as 20, the hygrometer's mean reading was 41 when qobar was conspicuous. Above 72 it disappeared.
  1889 January 3, Antoine d'Abbadie, in a letter to the editor of Nature, volume 39, pages 247-248
  Under the head of dry fog many writers include a sort of heat haze, which does not necessarily involve the suspension of either solid or liquid matter in the air, but is due to the mixing of local air currents of different densities, especially when evaporation is proceeding rapidly from moist ground under strong sunshine. The callina of Spain and the qobar of the upper Nile region are probably due partly to this cause, and partly to dust.
  1922, Charles Fitzhugh Talman, Meteorology: The Science of the Atmosphere, page 96
  Pietro Gandolfo, inside the old sedan, rumbled by, hidden by the dunes and the early morning qobar, dry fog of the Nile. He fidgeted nervously. He had no idea what to expect ahead.
  2010, Charles Barnett, Iscariot, page 265