Super Typhoon Meranti Blew Up Fast, Heads For Taiwan, Mainland China [Greg Laden's Blog]

Within a 24 hour time period, Typhoon Meranti cranked up from what we in the US would call a Category 1 storm to a Category 5 storm. Or stronger, if we had more categories.

Some time between late Tuesday and mid day Wednesday, the typhoon will have a run at the southern tip of Taiwan. This is the less populated part of the island, but this is a big storm and its effects will be felt over the entire country.

Interacting with Taiwan is not expected to slow down the storm too much, and some time late Thursday, possibly as a Category 3 equivalent, it will slam into China.

Then it will go inland and contribute significantly to flooding.

This is the strongest cyclone so far in this year’s Northern Hemisphere season. Under climate change, we expect some cyclones to undergo much more rapid intensification, which can be a real problem when it occurs just before making landfall. This is the case with Meranti, though, as noted, the area to be affected initially is not as dense of a population zone as it might have been. The storm is stronger than it otherwise would have been had it not been for global warming, as well.

For a further discussion of human caused global warming and this storm, visit Climate Signals (Beta). The graphs above are from Weather Underground.