Why Do Deserts Get Cold At Night? - Science ABC

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Due to a lack of humidity in deserts, the air cannot hold the heat radiated by the sand, which gets heated during the sunny daytime hours. This causes the temperature of deserts to fall rapidly at night. 

If you have ever seen Lawrence Of Arabia—a Hollywood movie from 1962 based on the life of a British lieutenant—then you may recall the scenes where the protagonist travels for days through vast deserts. He doesn’t know whether he will make it to his destination or if he will get lost and perish in the seemingly endless desert.

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A still from Lawrence of Arabia. Notice the blanket.

During his travels through vast stretches of arid desert, he often rests at night covered in a blanket under the starlit sky. As I watched that scene in the movie, I couldn’t help but wonder… “Why does he have a blanket? Aren’t deserts supposed to be brutally hot?”

While deserts are famous for being cruelly hot during the daytime, many people don’t realize that they get surprisingly cold at night! 

But why does this happen?

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