Prepare yourselves for the second coming of Katrina, because you can bet that this storm will be hyped as an indicator of “global warming”.
As of this writing, the storm is in the process of making landfall in the Philippines and it is moving west at 20-25 knots and estimated winds of 170 knots (195mph).
Hurricane expert Dr. Ryan Maue has been monitoring the Super Typhoon for the past several days and remarked about the historic nature of Haiyan. In this upper echelon of cyclone intensity, it is difficult to assign rankings or compare Typhoons due to inhomogeneous observing networks and tools. But it’s fair to say that Super Typhoon Haiyan is as intense as a tropical cyclone can get.
Presented at AMS Tropical in 2004, Hoarau et al. asked if there were any Typhoons stronger than Tip (1979). Two likely candidates emerged including Super Typhoon Angela from 1995 which has been compared with today’s storm. Satellite estimates through Dvorak technique yielded an intensity of 90 m/s or 175 knots which is greater than Tip’s maximum of 165 knots. A quick comparison between Angela and Haiyan at maximum intensity suggests the latter is actually stronger. Dvorak estimates are at the top of the scale — T = 8.0 and even touched 8.1, which according to this chart, means 170-knot maximum 1-minute sustained winds. That is Category 5 with three pluses.
The actual best-tracks have Tip at 165-knots and there are many others that exceeded 155-knots. Here’s a handy list of advisories that met or exceeded 155 since 1950. The JTWC best tracks are increasingly uncertain prior to the satellite era (1979) but there is some confidence primarily due to routine aircraft recon from 1944-1987 in the Western Pacific. Aside from field studies (e.g. TPARC) run by NASA in coordination with neighboring nations, routine hurricane hunting does not occur outside of the Western Hemisphere.
Global landfalls were discussed in a recent J. Climate paper by Weinkle, Maue and Pielke Jr. Weinkle_2012.04
![vis0[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/11/vis01.jpg?quality=83)
Above: as morning breaks in the Philippines, one of the first two visible satellite images
Above: animation from IntelliWeather.com showing the last 12 hours of motion as of 1PM PST 11/7/13. – may take up to a minute to load and animate, depending on your connection speed.
With winds like that, expect to see complete devastation as it makes landfall. That of course will be hyped into an AGW caused storm, just like Katrina. Al Gore and Bill McKibben are already testing lies language on Twitter. Bear in mind that we have a very short historical record of Typhoon strength, and any claims that this is the strongest storm ever need to be qualified with that fact. Nobody has any credible record of typhoon strength back more than a few decades.
I’ll add updates and additional content to this article today – Anthony
===============================================================
UPDATE1: NOAA image as Haiyan prepares to make landfall:
UPDATE2: Haiyan is expected to make it all the way to China. Maue on Twitter:
12z ECMWF model shows #Haiyan maintaining deep central pressure of 947 mb as it moves quickly west thru S. China Sea
UPDATE3: Radar image from Cebu City shows the eye of Haiyan approaching, click image for animation:
UPDATE4: Dr. Heidi Cullen of Climate Central wins the “First Haiyan BS award” with this missive.
RT @NOAA: What's fueling #SuperTyphoon #Haiyan's intensity? Deep warm water: http://t.co/tfNWljssms Via @NOAASatellites #climate
— Heidi Cullen (@HeidiCullen) November 7, 2013
As Bob Tisdale observes, there’s nothing to support this along the track of Haiyan:
Lots of the typical BS accumulating already about Typhoon Haiyan. Let’s push some of it aside and present the sea surface temperature anomalies for the early portion of Haiyan’s storm track.
There was nothing unusually warm about the sea surface temperature anomalies for the early portion of Typhoon Haiyan’s storm track last week, the week of Wednesday October 30, 2013. We’ll have to wait for Monday to see what the values were for this week.
UPDATE5: Jeff Masters, makes this claim:
Super Typhoon Haiyan has made landfall. According to PAGASA, Haiyan came ashore at 4 am local time (20 UTC) November 7, 2013 near Guiuan, on the Philippine island of Samar. At the time, Guiuan reported sustained 10-minute average winds of 96 mph, with a pressure of 977 mb. Contact has since been lost with the city. Two hours before landfall, the Joint Typhoon Warning Center assessed Haiyan’s sustained winds at 195 mph, gusting to 235 mph, making it the 4th strongest tropical cyclone in world history. Satellite loops show that Haiyan weakened only slightly, if at all, in the two hours after JTWC’s advisory, so the super typhoon likely made landfall with winds near 195 mph. This makes Haiyan the strongest tropical cyclone on record to make landfall in world history. The previous record was held by the Atlantic’s Hurricane Camille of 1969, which made landfall in Mississippi with 190 mph winds.
Sorry, no. Super Typhoon Ida in 1958 is said to have central pressure of 877mb and 200 mph 1 minute sustained winds: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_Ida_%281958%29
C. L. Jordan (September 1959). “A Reported Sea Level Pressure of 877 MB.” (PDF). Monthly Weather Review. Retrieved 2011-11-23.
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Alan Robertson says:
November 7, 2013 at 4:41 pm
============
I don’t get it ?? ( I love Steven Wright).
It sure looks like a nasty cyclone is gonna affect someone.
They know what to do ??
Dr. Omni says:
November 7, 2013 at 1:58 pm
Keep in mind that the hurricane did not destroy New Orleans. The failed levee destroyed the ninth ward. The Crescent City of historical fame did not suffer huge damage.
It appears Heidi Cullen is culling (I couldn’t resist) her information from the National Obama Agenda Administration (otherwise known as the NOAA) website. At her twitter site she gave the link for which I copied the long address here along with a shortened statement from the NOAA:
http://www.nnvl.noaa.gov/MediaDetail2.php?MediaID=1452&MediaTypeID=1
‘The intensification of Super Typhoon Haiyan is being fueled by “ideal” environmental conditions – namely low wind shear and warm ocean temperatures. …Plotted here is the average Tropical Cyclone Heat Potential product for October 28 – November 3, 2013… This dataset, … shows the total amount of heat energy available for the storm to absorb, not just on the surface, but integrated through the water column. Deeper, warmer pools of water are colored purple, though any region colored from pink to purple has sufficient energy to fuel storm intensification. The dotted line represents the best-track and forecast data as of 16:00 UTC on November 7, 2013.’
Now, there’s a cadaverous gray map at the site with a trailing pink cloud like image (it’s more like an unappealing rusty red – make it ominous) running East to West with a Halloweeny purple (proper ominous image, again) cloud like image wafting inside. Northwest of this is a barely detectable dotted (if you can see the dots you’re hired) line indicating the storm track. It’s almost as if all they wanted you to see was the pink and purple ocean hot, hot, hot.
Below this inspirational graphic is a multicolor bar entitled, ‘Available energy’, starting at 0 which is colored in the cadaverous gray and ending at 225 where it’s colored in that Halloweeny purple color with shades of pink transitioning between the two. Now, what is this available energy you ask? Why it’s “(kJoules per cm cubed). So, the available energy which does not really appear to be in the Haida storm track (sign on the dotted line) runs from 0 kJoules per cm cubed to 225 kJoules per cm cubed. But don’t forget that the ‘deeper, warmer pools of water are colored purple’. So, apparently it’s not just the Joules that that multicolored horizontal bar represents but there may, possibly, perhaps be some depth hiding out in that bar there as well. You know, the heat hiding out in the deep. Who knows? But let’s return to a Joule which according to my information is equal to the heat required to raise the temperature of 1 g of water
0.24 °C. Got that? Just how many Godzillion gallons of water in the West Pacific are there? And how much energy would it take to raise three hundred trillion Godzillion gallons of water 0.24 °C in relation to grams? A Brontosaurium Godzillion trillion or a Jupiterillium Godzillium?
Now, at the bottom left of the linked NOAA website there’s a logo that says, in graceful serif type, USA, and then, .gov, indicating the website. Across and over the USA is a shooting star in reverse as if it’s aiming for the heavens. And then underneath the USA.gov is the reassuring statement (remove all sharp objects and don’t eat or have a mouthful of water) ‘Government Made Easy’.
Oh dear I live in Palawan Philippines and it is heading my way, I better do what Willis says and start preparing.
Nature defies models. I guess that deep ocean warming snuck through a suck hole to help out the typhoon. But history shows us it is not unique.
Loading exaggerated cAGW claims in 3, 2, 1
The Philippines, like every south east Asian country, has endured Typhoons/Cyclones/Hurricanes since they where first settled. Yes this one is huge and it will no doubt cause umpteen millions of dollars damage and there will be loss of life but it isn’t like this has never happened before. One thing that us westerners don’t have is a resilience built from a history of having to endure natural disasters without outside help.
Australia has a record and it was a Cat 4!
Severe Tropical Cyclone Olivia was a powerful Category 4 cyclone that produced the highest non-tornadic winds on record, 408 km/h (253 mph).
That was in 1996.
I should’ve added, that rather then checking out the NOAA’s website, I should’ve spent my time seeing if there’s any carrier task forces relatively nearby that can be sent to the region for assistance. To my knowledge carrier groups are the only rapidly moving floating cities that can provide abundant fresh water, transport, search and rescue, evacuation, and able bodied gallant strength to those in need. God speed.
An excellent source regarding Hurricane Camille is: http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/about_us/meet_us/roger_pielke/camille/index.html
WUWT regulars will note the name in the url.
I was in Biloxi at that time as my father was serving in the USAF: folks in base housing were evacuated onto Kessler AFB. Not to get into a p—–g contest about which storm is strongest, but unfortunately nothing survived on the ground near Camille’s center and, of course, satellite data was in infancy.
clipe says:
November 7, 2013 at 4:59 pm
I’ve been to Cebu City…
Not recommended for the naive.
clipe says:
November 7, 2013 at 5:29 pm
clipe says:
November 7, 2013 at 4:59 pm
I’ve been to Cebu City…
Not recommended for the naive.
=================
Got tales ?
A glimpse of the storm’s progress: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=1429784490569228&set=vb.1409343005946710&type=2&theater
There is a lot of mixing of ocean waters from this storm. What (if any) likely effect will this have on NH temperatures this winter?
We were under a super typhoon in the early 70’s. 40 deg. rolls at 200 feet— man battle stations and go deep–still noticable at >600 feet–
Thats a LOT of mixing….
And the islanders don’t have the luxery of thick metal walls—-sorry for them.
Any colder-than-normal upper air involved in this one? Ryan? Anthony?
So what? The thing is it’s the strongest storm to ever landfall. Why so ignorant when you should pray.
———–
“It will not be the second coming of Katrina because it will be in Manilla, and not in some famous city in the US or Europe. Katrina was “the perfect storm” because it destroyed an iconic city (New Orleans), and thus it was ideal for filling up the disaster movie narrative pushed by AGW alarmists. After all, we don’t see disaster movies set in relatively obscure places like Lagos or Kabul, we see them destroying places that audiences all over the world will recognize, like New York and Paris…”
u.k.(us) says:
November 7, 2013 at 5:36 pm
No. I wasn’t naive enough,
Here’s a graphic depicting the worst typhoons since 1970 to hit the Philippines. Note that four of the storms made their landfall at the same location.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=245857625570999&set=a.211004039056358.1073741831.163550757135020&type=1&theater
1964 wasn’t a bad year either:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1964_Pacific_typhoon_season
I can vouch for it. I was serving in Vietnam that year and me and my buddy pilot and load-master were operating a DHC-4 out of Nha Trang and had to evacuate to Danang when tropical storm Kate turned into a typhoon and hit the coast the next day.
I can still recall we lost sight of the ground at 400 ft and 3 hours later saw it again on landing about the same height after having to lay off a frightening amount of drift most of the way in cloud.
Luckily the weather warning provided by the USAF was a little better than that given to Admiral Halsey and we escaped the worst of it and I’m here to tell the tale.
Engr Millard says:
November 7, 2013 at 5:48 pm
“So what? The thing is it’s the strongest storm to ever landfall.”
Don’t know about “strongest” ever, since the TV has been reporting it is the strongest since 2010. Which means that the 2010 typhoon was stronger.
Thanks Anthony. Metro Manila is rather far from central Philippines where the storm will make a landfall today, and yet it’s dark here, almost all classes have been suspended. In provinces where the storm will make a landfall, there are reports that even concrete fences are swaying, like being rocked by an earthquake.
King of Cool says:
November 7, 2013 at 6:41 pm
….”serving in Vietnam that year and me and my buddy pilot and load-master were operating a DHC-4….”
==========================
“buddy pilot” is a new term for me.
Never heard it before, what does it mean ??
Buddy/pilot makes a lot of sense, dammit.
“Nobody has any credible record of most weather events back more than a few decades.”
Little more accurate
. We were under a super typhoon in the early 70′s. 40 deg. rolls at 200 feet— man battle stations and go deep–still noticable at >600 feet–
That’s what we need to complement weather flights into the eyeball – weather patrols under the hurricanes to measure that deep heat. Shouldn’t cost much at all.
Sounds like you might have been in one of our boomers or fast attacks under Typhoon Amy (Etang) in 1971 just off Guam M.I.
I was on the surface in a sub tender getting the crap beat out of us during that storm. I had bridge watch duty when winds were near 140 knots. Very interesting ride on the top too!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1971_Pacific_typhoon_season