Andhi (Dust Storm): Grit in Eyes and Hair, and How to Rinse
The sky goes the colour of tea before the wind even arrives, and then there is that smell, hot dust and something metallic. An andhi crosses the plains in the weeks before the rains, and a dust storm does most of its damage in the ten minutes you spend rubbing your eyes afterwards.
In brief
- The one rule: do not rub your eyes. Everything else is negotiable.
- Contacts out first, before any water touches your face.
- Hair: rinse with plain water before shampoo, or you grind grit into the scalp.
- Shut the house early. You get a few minutes of warning from the colour of the sky.
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What a dust storm actually leaves on you
Andhi dust is not the fine, invisible stuff of smog season. It is coarse: soil, sand, powdered road, bits of plant matter, whatever the field upwind was carrying. That coarseness changes what it does.
In the eye it behaves like grit. Because it is grit. It scratches. A single particle sitting under the upper lid will feel like a thorn and will keep scratching every time you blink, which is why the real injury from a dust storm is usually a corneal scratch caused by rubbing rather than by the dust itself.
In hair it wedges into the cuticle and, on an oiled scalp, sticks. On skin it sits on the surface with sweat, which is why faces feel gritty and tight afterwards, and why people reach straight for a scrub. In the chest it is the coarse and medium particles that set off coughing and wheeze, and the hours during and just after a storm are a known bad window for anyone with asthma.
Eyes first, and how to rinse properly
Memorise this part. You will be doing it in a hurry, with your eyes streaming and your hands shaking.
- Hands, then lenses. Wash hands with soap for 20 seconds. If you wear contact lenses, take them out before anything else, and throw away daily lenses rather than trying to save them.
- Do not rub. Let the eye water for 30 seconds first. Tears push a surprising amount of loose grit to the inner corner on their own.
- Rinse with sterile saline, or clean water if that is what you have, holding the lid open, for a good 60 seconds per eye. A cup or a clean jug poured slowly from the inner corner outward works better than splashing.
- Blink in the water if you can manage a small clean bowl. Ten slow blinks under water dislodges what a splash misses.
- Check under the upper lid if it still feels like something is there. Look down, take the lashes and gently lift the lid away and slightly out. Someone else’s steady hands help. Never poke at the eye with a cloth corner, a matchstick or a cotton bud.
- Cool compress for 5 minutes afterwards, and preservative-free artificial tears from a pharmacy if the eye stays scratchy, used as the box directs.
Three things people do that make it worse: rubbing, rinsing with rose water or kajal-stained fingers, and putting drops in that belonged to somebody else. Old medicated eye drops in the cupboard are not a general purpose rinse, and steroid drops in particular can do real harm on a scratched eye.
Contact lens rules during andhi season
Lenses and dust storms are a poor combination. One rule here is genuinely important rather than merely tidy.
Never rinse lenses, or a lens case, with tap water. Not boiled and cooled, not filtered, not bottled. Water can carry an organism called acanthamoeba that causes a rare but very serious eye infection, and contact lens wearers are the people it happens to. Solution only, every time, and let the case air dry upside down.
During the storm season, switch to glasses on windy days if you have the option, especially for a bike or a scooter ride, and if you are caught out in lenses, remove them at the first clean opportunity rather than pushing through. Discard dailies. For monthlies, rub and rinse with solution and, if the eye was sore at all, give it a day in glasses before going back in.
Any eye pain, light sensitivity, blurring or persistent redness in a lens wearer is a same-day matter for an eye doctor, not a wait-and-see. That group gets a lower threshold than everyone else.
Hair and scalp after a dust storm
| Instinct | Better | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Straight to shampoo and scrub hard | 2 minutes of plain lukewarm water first | Rinsing lifts loose grit out. Lathering into dry dusty hair grinds it across the scalp. |
| Nails on the scalp | Fingertips, light pressure | Scalp is already scratched by grit. Nails add to it and that is how the itching starts. |
| Two or three shampoos to feel clean | One, diluted, concentrated on the scalp | Repeat washes strip the lengths and leave hair rough, which reads as still dirty. |
| Brushing dusty hair before washing | Shake it out, then wash, then detangle wet with conditioner on | Dry brushing drags grit down the hair shaft and breaks it. |
| Oiling the same evening | Oil the night before wash day, not after a storm | Oil on a dusty scalp holds the dust there. |
Wash on the day of a storm if your hair took the full hit. That is not over-washing. That is a specific reason. Where people get into trouble is stripping the lengths repeatedly through a windy fortnight and then fighting frizz, which is the same argument as the monsoon frizz routine from the opposite direction.
If the scalp is itching and flaking for days after, resist the urge to reach for a strong anti-dandruff product immediately, because dust irritation and actual dandruff are not the same thing. The dandruff piece covers how to tell them apart.
The house, before and after
You usually get five or ten minutes of warning: the light changes, the birds go quiet, the wind turns cool and gusty. Use them.
Shut windows and doors on the windward side first, then the rest, and bring in washing, charpais, cushions and anything fabric under cover. Unplug sensitive electronics if the storm is likely to bring a power surge, which these often do as the supply flickers. Move pots and anything loose off ledges and balcony railings, because in a serious andhi those become projectiles.
Afterwards, damp cloth and damp mop only. Dry sweeping a room that is covered in fine dust just puts it back in the air and into the next person’s chest. Work top down: surfaces, then furniture, then floor. Change pillowcases if the bedroom window was open, wash the doormat, and give curtains a shake outdoors rather than in the room.
Keep windows shut until the air outside has visibly settled, which is often an hour or two after the wind drops. Opening up while dust is still suspended undoes the whole exercise.
The old habits around andhi are practical rather than medicinal: the dupatta or a folded cloth pulled across the face and wrapped over the head, the chaadar over the face lying down, and the instruction to keep your eyes shut and walk with the wind at your back rather than into it. Ayurvedic seasonal conduct treats the windy pre-monsoon weeks as a time when dryness and vata rise and favours oiling the body and covering up. Take the covering up literally and the rest as custom. A cloth over the face keeps out visible grit, which is exactly the problem here, though it does nothing for the fine particles of smog season, which need a properly sealed respirator.
Chests, asthma and who should stay in
The hours around a dust storm are a genuinely risky window for some people. This section is not about comfort.
Anyone with asthma should be indoors with the windows shut before the storm arrives if at all possible, with a reliever inhaler in a pocket rather than in a cupboard in another room. The same goes for COPD, and for children who wheeze with colds, while older relatives and anyone with heart or lung disease should not be out in it, and should not be doing the sweeping afterwards either. Pregnancy is reason enough to hand the post-storm cleaning to somebody else.
If you have to be outside, cover your mouth and nose with cloth, keep your eyes as shut as you can manage, and get behind a solid wall rather than a tree or a hoarding. Stop the bike. A loaded bike in a crosswind gust is a bad place to be, and visibility drops to nothing faster than people expect.
Get eye care the same day for eye pain rather than mere grittiness, any change or blurring in vision, sensitivity to light, a persistent feeling that something is still in the eye after rinsing, visible bleeding in the eye, or anything that struck the eye at speed. Contact lens wearers with a sore red eye should be seen urgently, and should not wear lenses again until they have been. Never try to remove anything that is stuck in or embedded in the eye. For chests, seek urgent help for breathing difficulty, a wheeze that a reliever does not settle, chest tightness, blue lips, or a child breathing fast, pulling in at the ribs or unable to finish a sentence.
Where this fits in the year
Dust storm weeks sit in the gap between peak heat and the rains, which means you are often dealing with them on top of the peak summer routine and then straight into damp season. The other big air problem on the plains arrives with the cold, and it needs an entirely different response, covered in the smog season piece. The full year sits on the Season Shift hub.
Something is still in my eye after rinsing. What now?
Check under the upper lid once, gently, with clean hands. If it still feels like something is there after that, stop and see an eye doctor the same day. That sensation often means a scratch on the surface rather than a particle still sitting there, and rubbing to find it makes the scratch worse.
Can I use rose water to rinse my eyes after a dust storm?
It is a common habit but it is not a rinse. Cosmetic rose water can contain fragrance and preservatives, and a bottle that has been open for months is not clean. Use plain clean water or sterile saline, and keep the rose water for your face.
Is a dupatta over the face enough protection?
For visible grit in the wind, yes, that is what it is good at. For the fine particles that matter in pollution it does very little. Different problem, different equipment.
Should I wash my hair every time there is an andhi?
If it took the full force of it, yes. Rinse with plain water first, use one diluted shampoo on the scalp, and condition the lengths. The over-washing worry applies to habit, not to a scalp that is genuinely full of soil.
My eyes are red for a day afterwards. Is that normal?
Mild redness and wateriness that improves through the day is common after dust exposure, but redness with pain, discharge, light sensitivity or blurring is not, and it should be looked at rather than treated with drops from the cupboard.
Do I need to change my contact lens routine in the windy season?
Glasses on storm days if you can, dailies discarded after any dusty exposure, and never any water near the lenses or the case. That last one matters more than it sounds, because of a rare but serious water-borne eye infection.
How long should I keep the windows shut afterwards?
Until the air outside looks clear again, usually an hour or two after the wind drops. Opening up too early simply lets the settling dust back in.