In just a few months, a planet-wide dust storm is expected to completely cover Mars, blocking light from the sun and hiding the Red Planet’s features.

This type of global dust storm has been difficult to predict, but researchers have reason to believe that they may be linked to Mars’ motion around the gravitational center of the solar system, reports Smithsonian.com. NASA atmospheric scientist James Shirley says Mars can gain or lose both rotational and orbital energy as it moves through the solar system. The energy added to the planet can give it the necessary push to change regional gusts of dust into planet-wide squalls that can last for months.

While Martian dust storms are pretty common, global dust storms are rarer.

“Every year there are some moderately big dust storms that pop up on Mars and they cover continent-sized areas and last for weeks at a time,” NASA planetary scientist Michael Smith said in a 2015 article. “Once every three Mars years (about 5 ½ Earth years), on average, normal storms grow into planet-encircling dust storms, and we usually call those ‘global dust storms’ to distinguish them.”

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These storms are the result of sunlight hitting the ground on Mars and warming the air closest to the surface, leaving the upper air cooler. Like thunderstorms on Earth, the warm and cool air become unstable, with warm air rising up and taking dust with it. The rising plumes canform everything from small dust devils to continent-sized storms, which sometimes come together to create the global storms that cover the entire planet.

Massive dust storms typically happen during summer in Mars’ southern hemisphere, according to NASA. Like Earth, seasons on Mars are caused by the tilt of the planet, but Mars’ orbit is less circular than Earth’s. For part of a Martian year, the planet is closer to the sun, which makes it significantly hotter and brings radiative heat forces to their strongest point.

If the projected storm doesn't happen this year, scientists are calling for another, possibly more powerful one in 2018, when the dust storm season lines up with the solar system center again. That storm would be between 30 and 40 percent larger than the one anticipated for this year.

Even if neither year produces a dust storm, a failed prediction can still help scientists better understand what's going on in Mars' atmosphere.

"Science advances by failing sometimes," said Shirley.

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