Category 5 Super Typhoon Meranti is strongest storm of 2016 season
Churning the waters of the Northwest Pacific is the strongest tropical cyclone of the 2016 Northern Hemisphere season: Super Typhoon Meranti. It is the fourth Category 5 storm on Earth this year, which is close to the annual average of between four and five such storms.
Super Typhoon Meranti, which according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center had maximum sustained winds of 155 knots, or nearly 180 miles per hour, as of Monday evening eastern time, has southern Taiwan and coastal China in its sights for the middle of the week.
Fluctuations in the storm's intensity are likely before Meranti makes its closest pass to southern Taiwan on Wednesday, but it is likely to still be a powerful Typhoon at that time. Taiwan's second-most populous city, Kaohsiung City, is located in the southwest part of the island.
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Super Typhoon Meranti is the seventh category 4 or 5 storm to form during the Northern Hemisphere's 2016 storm season, but beat Super Typhoon Nepartak in terms of its estimated maximum sustained winds.
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The forecast calls for the storm to be weaker when it passes close to, if not over, parts of Taiwan on Sept. 14.
Computer model projections show the storm may pass through the Luzon strait to the south of Taiwan while weakening from a major typhoon to a Category 1 or 2 storm before it hits the Chinese mainland on Sept. 15.
The storm could hit the port city of Hong Kong, which has a population of more than 7.2 million people, on Sept. 15.
The intensity of the storm at that point will greatly depend on whether or not it first makes landfall in Taiwan, however, which would cause greater weakening than if its center were to remain over the sea.
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On satellite imagery Monday, the storm resembles a textbook image of a powerful typhoon. It is converting heat built up in the ocean into towering, spiraling thunderstorms, with a pinpoint-sized eye in the middle, where the air pressure is lowest.
In the narrow ring of storms surrounding the eye, known as the "eye wall," the storm may be capable of producing wind gusts of nearly 215 miles per hour, according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center.
Andrew Freedman is Mashable's Senior Editor for Science and Special Projects. Prior to working at Mashable, Freedman was a Senior Science writer for Climate Central. He has also worked as a reporter for Congressional Quarterly and Greenwire/E&E Daily. His writing has also appeared in the Washington Post, online at The Weather Channel, and washingtonpost.com, where he wrote a weekly climate science column for the "Capital Weather Gang" blog. He has provided commentary on climate science and policy for Sky News, CBC Radio, NPR, Al Jazeera, Sirius XM Radio, PBS NewsHour, and other national and international outlets. He holds a Masters in Climate and Society from Columbia University, and a Masters in Law and Diplomacy from The Fletcher School at Tufts University.
