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Largest and Most Intense Tropical Cyclone On Record Hits the Philippines
mrspoonsi writes "A monstrous storm has arisen in the Western Pacific. The storm, called 'Supter-Typhoon Haiyan', has become the year's most intense. It bore down on the central Philippines this morning, packing winds up to 195 mph (314 km/h), with gusts up to 235 mph (378 km/h), threatening massive damage and sending over 100,000 people into evacuation centers. (Animation of landfall.) Flood waters went as high as 10 feet. The secretary general of the Philippine National Red Cross said, 'About 90% of the infrastructure and establishments were heavily damaged.'"
It's estimated central pressure is 899 mb but it could be lower. The lower the pressure the stronger the storm. Since 1987, there have been only four storms in the western Pacific with a central pressure below 899 mb (Megi in 2010, 885 mb; Flo in 1990 890 mb; Ruth in 1991 895 mb; and Yuri in 1991 895 mb)
Hulk SMASH Celiac Disease
I would say that a huge storm that can possibly make millions of people homeless, and kill thousands would definitely fit the description "stuff that matters".
I imagine the suffering from this storm will be severe and can only hope that the help was mobilized before the storm struck. These storm victims are going to need everything to survive. Food, housing and medical care as well as tools and livestock to start over could save countless lives. Imagine a storm that severe striking Miami or New York.
The Saffir scale tops out Level 5, > 157 mph. But each level increases about 20-25 mph. It is essentially a 500 mile wide tornado.
Haiyan is the name given to the super typhoon by the World Meteorological Organization (source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-24863480 )
What I understood is that the Philippines counts the number of storms that hit the country (this is the 25th this year!!), so in their counting, it gets a name with a Y. (Source: http://blogs.wsj.com/searealtime/2013/11/08/from-haiyan-to-yolanda-how-the-philippines-names-its-storms/ )
But what can the /. community do? We're all underpaid tech nerds living off Ramen noodles. =(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charo
I'm no meteorologist but those wind speeds would make this an F4 tornado. We get tornadoes here in the middle of North America, but they don't last for days. Good luck to everybody there.
You knew the job was dangerous when you took it. -- Super Chicken
Yes. Obama created this storm to destroy his Kenyan birth certificate that his mother secreted at an Indonesia Bank as it was foretold by a witch doctor before his birth that he would one day be president and it would be necessary to conspire to plant a fake birth certificate and an announcement in a Hawaii while securely deposited the real documents in a place far from the reach of the Fancy Haired One that would someday come searching for it. This not so farfetched. I have seen many claims that this supernatural powered president created Sandy to win the election. Two Sup(t)er Storms! How grand.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Are you serious? The average American weighs 450lb.
Yeah how dare they live where natural disasters could hit! They should be in one of the few regions in North America or Europe which have an unusually low number of natural disasters. Anywhere else and you might as well be sitting on god's shooting range like those crazy Japanese who nobody ever offers aid to due to their recklessness.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
This one goes beyond the bad category, is not the same falling from a chair than falling from the top of a building. We are getting a hint on how bad could be "extreme" weather, much stronger than Sandy and Katrina. You really don't want any of this "bad weather" hit any place near you, and it could become the new normal.
That US bases there. Plenty of extra help.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I'm sure that the relief agencies would be happy to take a donation. I think these are correct, but double check for yourself. I apologize for not including everybody, please don't let that stop you from making a donation.
American Red Cross
British Red Cross
Canadian Red Cross
Australian Red Cross
New Zealand Red Cross
Irish Red Cross
Deutsches Rotes Kreuz
Croix-Rouge Francaise
Röda Korset
Røde Kors
Røde Kors
Rode Kruis
Schweizerisches Rotes Kreuz
Croce Rossa Italiana
Cruz Roja Española
Polski Czerwony Krzyz
Salvation Army donations
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
A magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck the PI a few weeks ago which cause widespread damage to buildings and infrastructure. Bridges collapsed and many roads are still impassible. The earthquake and hundreds of strong aftershocks serve to intensify the effects of this storm.
Interesting,eh? This is when Slashdot moderation gets scary.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Just hope the red light cameras get knocked out first. I'd hate to see the ticket when my car gets blown through a red light when moving near 200MPH!
Someone with a brain mod the grandparent flamebait. Poor planning doesn't kill. Planks falling down from houses do. Poor planning, overpopulation and lack of education just decrease the life expectation by increasing the chance of an early death.
People are welcome to live where they want, but it does help to build something strong enough to keep the rain out. There is no such thing as a 'natural' disaster. Poverty and corruption and negligence are responsible for the suffering.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Typhoon Ida (1958) had sustained winds of 200mph. That means that the energy in its winds was about 5% greater than the energy in the 195mph winds of Typhoon Haiyan (squaring speed to get approximate wind energy).
Yeah how dare they live where natural disasters could hit! They should be in one of the few regions in North America or Europe which have an unusually low number of natural disasters.
People tend to live in places which have some unique economic advantage: fertile ground, a navigable river or deep water port. The miner will be looking for mountain-building, the rancher, grasslands on which to raise cattle. To get what you want you can't always play it safe.
...hopefully they'll leave the cholera at home this time.
Walk up to a New Jerseyite whose beach house on LBI was flattened by Sandy and tell him it wasn't a natural disaster, it was "corruption and negligence" (not poverty, those houses aren't cheap). Go ahead, tell him that. Then report back your findings.
Yeah, fuck 'em. I feel the same about the assholes who rebuilt their houses in the same place they were flooded out by the Mississippi river, and demanded to be covered by their insurance at the same rates! The Mexicans sat under Wilma for 48 full hours and nobody died and property damage was minimal, including the houses on the beach. Lights were back on in the center of town in less than 12 hours. Well made concrete and underground electrical lines hold up pretty well. Sorry, I cannot sympathize. Their houses were flattened because they were not built to withstand a little wind and rain. A hurricane should not be a big deal. And they aren't with a little foresight and proper planning, and a lot less tolerance for corrupt government/corporate power. They serve as a reminder to stock up on more beer.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Wilma had wind speeds of 240 km/h at the time it made landfall in Mexico. Haiyan had wind speeds of 315 km/h when it made landfall (highest wind at landfall ever recorded). Knowing that structural stress on buildings goes approximately with the square of the wind speed (kinetic energy and things), that's almost twice as powerful. Many general aviation airplanes (for example the cessna 172) have "never exceed speeds" that are lower than 315 km/h; in other words, if you make a dive and reach that kind of speed, you're at risk of your airplane disintegrating. I have strong doubts about the economic feasibility of building houses that can reliably withstand such wind speeds, especially in poorer countries. It's like trying to mount a house on top of a (non-American) high-speed train and take it to top speed.
...so instead of making snarky remarks on the internet about unrealistic building standards and people making the bad choice of being born in a poor country, better pray for those who will lose their lives in that monster.
I'm no meteorologist but those wind speeds would make this an F4 tornado. We get tornadoes here in the middle of North America, but they don't last for days. Good luck to everybody there.
Very strong tropical cyclones like this one do contain very high sustained winds equivalent to what you would find in a significant (F3 or higher) tornado, which is why the NWS occasionally issues blanket tornado warnings for areas lying in the path of the most intense and dangerous part of a hurricane's eyewall, which is usually the NE quadrant. The practice is controversial, though, and has been inconsistently applied. Keep in mind that wind speed isn't everything when it comes to how much damage is done by a storm, in a tornado there are sudden shifts in pressure and wind direction that you wouldn't necessarily find in a cyclone's eyewall, while the winds from a cyclone generally last a lot longer and of course with a cyclone you also have storm surge and flooding to worry about. Both types of storm are incredibly dangerous, but a structure that might survive the one could still be totally wiped out by the other, and vice versa, even if the wind speeds involved were pretty much the same.