While we wait for wacky antagonist Greg Laden to make a decision on whether he’ll chip and and help the relief effort, here are some useful bits of information that help put this storm into the perspective of “worst ever” claims, and opportunistic claims about it being a product of global warming, like Greenpeace is doing:
But, when you look at the science for tropical cyclones in the region, such claims don’t even begin to hold up. These two papers show the reality from data – no trend, either in landfall or in total frequency/intensity of storms:
Kubota, H. and Chan, J.C.L. 2009. Interdecadal variability of tropical cyclone landfall in the Philippines from 1902 to 2005. Geophysical Research Letters 36: 10.1029/2009GL038108.
“Despite global warming during the 20th century the number of tropical cyclones annually making landfall in the Philippines did not experience any net change. All variability was merely oscillatory activity around a mean trend of zero slope”
This is also backed up in Weinkle et al., 2012:
From currently available historical TC records, we constructed a long-period global hurricane landfall dataset using a consistent methodology. We have identified considerable interannual variability in the frequency of global hurricane landfalls; but within the resolution of the available data, our evidence does not support the presence of significant long-period global or individual basin linear trends for minor, major, or total hurricanes within the period(s) covered by the available quality data.
Therefore, our long-period analysis does not support claims that increasing TC landfall frequency or landfall intensity has contributed to concomitantly increasing economic losses.
Weinkle et al. Figure 2 A and C show the lack of trend:
Note that the WPAC represents the area including the Philippines:
It seems abundantly clear then that any claim trying to tie Typhoon Haiyan to a pattern of increased frequency of storms supposedly driven by “global warming” is patently false.
The news of Typhoon Haiyan is being bandied about in COP18 When Seth Borenstein doesn’t write articles for AP, here is the sort of balanced reporting you get: (h/t to Ryan Maue)
Typhoon Haiyan overshadows UN climate talks
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/typhoon-haiyan-overshadows-un-climate-talks
And, the Washington Post points out something that puts the tragedy of Haiyan in perspective:
Most weather experts expected reports of horrific damage and high loss of life given the intensity of the storm and geography of the affected areas, but not many were prepared when Philippine officials estimated that as many as 10,000 people may have died in Tacloban City alone when Haiyan struck.
If this death toll estimate holds up, however, it wouldn’t even put Haiyan in the top 35 deadliest tropical cyclones on record.
The most recent credible death toll report on Haiyan is 1,774:
Figures from the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council showed the number of dead stood at 1,774, radio dzBB’s Paulo Santos reported.
Here is the top 35 list of Deadliest Cyclones from Weather Underground:
Better awareness, and better warnings thanks to technology combined with evacuations helped make Haiyan less of a tragedy than it could have been, though in the case of Tacloban, topography was the biggest factor in evacuations according to WaPo:
Mass evacuations of this sort are just not possible in some regions of the world, and this was certainly true of Tacloban and its surroundings. Many people in Tacloban were evacuated to sturdier buildings within the city itself, but due to the fact that the city lies on an island that is mostly mountainous, moving people out of the city and into other areas wasn’t possible.
For those that wish to help, see the Red Cross graphic on the WUWT sidebar, or follow this link: http://ushare.redcross.org.ph/
_Jim says:
November 11, 2013 at 8:38 pm
> What was the conclusion of the (Old?) Farmers Almanac again for this winter?
From http://www.almanac.com/weather/longrange/NH/Concord , it expects November
to be 1F below average and December 1F above average.
Tad: “In the meantime, the “Climate Change Commissioner” for the Philippines is saying things like, “To climate change doubters, visit PH”, and “We refuse to accept typhoons as way of life”.”
Frankly, I’d rather they dissemble in the face of cruelty than that they turned their incompetence loose on relief efforts.
Jquip says:
November 11, 2013 at 10:28 pm
The Philippines doesn’t have much choice but to accept typhoons as a way of life, unless they can move their islands about 15 degrees of latitude south to center on the Equator.
milodon, if we rent a few tugboats and then sequester a lot of CO2 under it…
Jquip says:
November 11, 2013 at 11:07 pm
That’s the ticket!
Or we could use cheap fossil fuel energy to enrich the people so that they could afford to evacuate areas threatened by typhoons or build sturdier dwellings, as in Japan…Nah, that would never work!
I have struggled to contain myself at the actions and commentary on the typhoon from some on the Green side.
Let’s be clear. If you die, you die. Whether you die in the company of 12, 1,200 or 120,000 others you are dead in the same way and to the same extent. The only reason the numbers matter is to the living. If one person dies, there are others to comfort and support their surviving relatives, dependents and friends in their grief and misery. If 1,200 die the situation is much worse – not only do the survivors have to take care of themselves and each other in a way that they could never have been adequately prepared for, but the infrastructure and services on which their way of life was based may have disappeared, and require rebuilding and re-manning over a considerable time. If 120,000 die, then the deeper fabric of society may be submerged along with them. Culture, values, continuity of civilisation are all threatened, and this threat can spread out and affect the rest of the world. This is why it is important to know how big a disaster actually is.
Part of the threat to society that is presented by such a disruptive event is posed by those who take advantage of it for their own ends. This has always been true. Looters, phony charities, invading armies even – have all appeared in the wake of famine, earthquake and pestilence. To this number, unfortunately, we must now add the political looters of the climate alarmists. They steal the misery of those suffering, and the humanity of those watching and helping, to pursue their own programme of changing society. They are recruiting suffering as a child-soldier from the wreckage. They must be opposed by people of humanity and good will, with the same determination, intelligence and organisation in the wider world as that rescue and revival effort currently taking place in the stricken area itself.
I have never felt such distaste before at the antics of the alarmists. Maybe it’s because this time I was anticipating them. Listening to the news reports, knowing how ‘convenient’ the typhoon could be to the bear-baiters and dog-fighters at the UN climate conference, I spent several days ‘waiting for the other shoe to fall’. When it happened, when I heard the first (in my case BBC) mention of the possibility of further disasters ’caused’ by climate change, my first reaction was perversely delighted. I was right, they were going to exploit it! Ever since, I’ve just felt overwhelmingly sad. Thank you to everyone contributing to this and the other sites dedicated to exposing the perverse nonsense being peddled, and the cost to us all of letting it go unchallenged.
I must apologise to those Greens who are not CAGW activists (my previous) – there must be some of you, and I don’t mean to lump you all together…
I grew up near Manila, and typhoons were just a fact of life. Rainy season starts in June, conveniently also the start of the school year. Then rains start to taper in December leading to mostly dry weather through May. I’ve been through a couple of strong typhoons in my twenty years there. Fortunately they were only strong enough to uproot two of our avocado trees and topple some banana plants in our backyard. Some minor flooding, no roof damage and all walls intact. Manila encounters more floods, but it doesn’t take a typhoon to that, although floods are what typhoons generally bring to the city. I would say my typhoon experience and tolerance is average to maybe below average for a Filipino. While one of the maps above shows the country historically ravaged by storms, to the average person, Yolanda is really quite unexpected. It will be a new and painful reminder during the rainy season..
Gad Levin says:
November 11, 2013 at 8:40 pm
I just read at: http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2013/11/10/typhoon-yolanda-the-strongest-since-2006/ that in 2006 there was a typhoon in the Philippines which reached wind speed of 320 kph compared to 275 of the current storm. The name was Reming (Durian).
and 320 kph was just the speed of the Durian smell…
Jimbo:
At November 11, 2013 at 4:49 pm you say to Pippen Kool,
WUWT is a science blog so you need to provide evidence for an assertion especially when the assertion seems improbable. So, please provide your evidence that Pippen Kool has reached puberty.
Richard
davidmhoffer says:
November 11, 2013 at 8:52 pm
You, sir, are waaaaAAAaaay out of their demographic.
I only ever ‘comment’ at ‘news’ sites now for sh!ts and g!ggles. Almost all of my polite, referenced stuff gets binned.
MattS says:
November 11, 2013 at 3:55 pm
“If you think global warming causes more intense storms then Greenpeace has it right, water vapor is after all the most prevalent and the most potent of the greenhouse gases. :-)”
Gleick says we’re running out of water so that should take care of Global Warming. And of typhoons.
For those like me who dislike the Red Cross: Listing of 12 other organizations.
hunter says: @ur momisugly November 11, 2013 at 8:18 pm
The frustrating thing when a high level insider like Yeb Sano makes a plea like this is that he is diverting attention from his failure to help prepare his nation for the inevitability of storms.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Beat me to it. CAGW is a God Sent for incompetent bureaucrats who wasted money instead of protecting their communities. No they can turn around and blame the tax payer. What a deal.
Tad says:
November 11, 2013 at 7:23 pm………………
What this venal jerk is posturing for is $$$$$$. and big bundles at that.
Without a doubt the biggest cause of the number of deaths is the 3rd world infrastucture of the area and the topography. With decent construction standards and a competent Government many deaths could have been avoided. But, I can virtually guarantee that any funds spent on redeveloping the area will be rorted by corrupt officials and the same thing will happen again in time.
Sad but true.
regards
“Gleick says we’re running out of water so that should take care of Global Warming. And of typhoons.”
OMG are we running out of water now, too?
Just have a review of Australia’s experience with water, when they went through their ‘running out of water’ fear mongering awhile back. Thank god for the early-adopter Australians, they have already been everywhere that our present alarmists are trying to send us.
Lubos Motl:
“Typhoon Haiyan: similar unspectacular cyclones arrive every 2-3 years
“Today in the morning, I was stunned by the dishonesty of the professional climate alarmists again. Their moral defects are just shocking. It seems completely obvious to me that they must know that they are lying 24 hours a day.”
http://motls.blogspot.com/2013/11/typhoon-haiyan-similar-unspectacular.html
@ur momisugly ntesdorf; 11/11, 9:49pm
The typhoon that struck the Philippines produced an outpouring of emotion on Monday at United Nations talks on a global climate treaty in Warsaw, where delegates were quick to suggest that a warming planet had turned the storm into a lethal monster.
Olai Ngedikes, the lead negotiator for an alliance of small island nations, said in a statement that the typhoon, named Haiyan, which by some estimates killed 10,000 people in one city alone, “serves as a stark reminder of the cost of inaction on climate change and should serve to motivate our work in Warsaw.”
Scientists largely agree that it appears that storms will become more powerful as the climate changes. Dr. Emanuel helped write a 2010 study, for example, that forecast that the average intensity of hurricanes and typhoons — different names for the same phenomenon — would increase by up to 11 percent by the end of the century.
Typhoon Haiyan, with winds of at least 140 miles an hour, was considered one of the strongest storms to make landfall on record. “The data suggests that things like this will be more frequent with global warming,” said James P. Kossin, an atmospheric scientist at the National Climatic Data Center.
Dr. Emanuel said that as the planet warms because of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases, the difference between sea and air temperatures increases. It is this difference that fuels these kinds of cyclonic storms.
“As you warm the climate, you basically raise the speed limit on hurricanes,” he said.
NYT; http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/12/world/asia/typhoon-in-philippines-casts-long-shadow-over-un-talks-on-climate-treaty.html?_r=1&
Pippen Kool says:
November 11, 2013 at 3:55 pm
“But, why do you ignore the relative power of the typhoon? or the fact that even with massive movements of people out of harms way—something they could not do in the 1800’s—thousands of people still die.”
They couldn’t do it NOW either. When you live cheek-to-jowl in a city on an otherwise mountainous forested island, there is nowhere for “Massive” movements to go. So who is ignoring the data? Blind adherence to a meme has blinded you indeed.
@ur momisugly Pippen Kool, 11/11 3:55pm
In your haste to show that the Haiyan is not the worse typhoon ever, you look at lost of life in the Bay of Bengali where a high population lives within a few meters of sea level. So you are looking at where the typhoon landed not how bad the typhoon was.
And then we look are the number of typhoons. zzzzz.
But, why do you ignore the relative power of the typhoon? or the fact that even with massive movements of people out of harms way—something they could not do in the 1800’s—thousands of people still die.
Your arguments seem embarrassingly weak because you miss, no, ignore the obvious.
Care to explain all the other hurricanes, typhoons, cyclones, tornadoes, floods, droughts, bushfires, etc. (many of which have been more severe and devastating than present) BEFORE so-called manmade CO2 induced climate change took place?
It’s places like Bangladesh I at feel sorry for, if my sums are correct in that storm record hey have lost some 1.6M people, & been hit some 1 times! If reporters can’t even get the units right & know the difference between km & miles, no one stands much chance of learning anything, unless they come here of course!
Doesn’t global warming actually mitigate storm strength? Storm strength is a direct measure of the energy being transferred from one place (ocean) to another (atmosphere). Efficiency is effectively increased with increased differences between the two locations. Global warming itself would lower the differential between the two locations. This would reduce the efficiency and thus actually make weaker storms.
But, hey, lets not allow laws of nature to get in our way!
“Philippines President Benigno Aquino III told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday that a well-publicized estimate that Typhoon Haiyan killed 10,000 people in his country is “too much,” and that the death toll likely is closer to 2,000 or 2,500. “We’re hoping to be able to contact something like 29 municipalities left wherein we still have to establish their numbers, especially for the missing, but so far 2,000, about 2,500, is the number we are working on as far as deaths are concerned,” he said.”
CNN
They call WUWT out for pointing out reality, then go on to say the philopino delegate has integity because he’s attemping to extort a change based on emotion and his country’s absolute failure to deal with the reality of existng in the path of tropical stoms.
[Link snipped. No need to give that blog any oxygen. — mod.]
I remember Typhoon Freda that hit Vancouver in 1962. There have been some very strong winds since but no typhoons. I agree that it is sickening that the alarmists use a situation such as this to advance their cause. And for the MSM to use the phrase “strongest typhoon ever”? When I ask out loud “ever” people look at me and say “well…….”.
Greenpeace, from their support of and funding for uncivilized acts from vandalism to near piracy, is not an organization that offers credible ideas. There role in society is closer to that of parasites than participants in advancing good causes or helping to relieve human suffering.