This strikes me as a fairly active western Pacific weather pattern for this early in the season.

And keep in mind Beryl was the earliest Atlantic Cat 4 storm on record.

That's the full production-line look. Apart from Gaemi, there could be another one or even two in the pipeline looking at that sat image.

This forecast chart for Wed, July 24 shows that Taipei is in play for either a serious impact, or a glancing blow at least.

Wind speed is not massive at this stage, & travelling quite fast, which is good - we'll see what happens.

There's been some significant change in the last 24 hrs. Tracks now have it heading towards Ilan/Hualien border.
Sustained wind speed has jumped to 120kts (220km) with gusts up to 145! (270km). That's super-typhoon strength - bound to cause serious damage.

Strangely, there's no obvious high pressure ridge to the north that's pushing it west & nudging landfall to the south. Appears to be a wrap-around effect from a high-pressure to the east that's engulfing it. I hope Hualien doesn't cop it - they've had enough already.

JTWC says: CURRENT STEERING MECHANISM: DEEP-LAYERED SUBTROPICAL RIDGE (STR)
ENTRENCHED TO THE EAST, WITH A WESTWARD EXTENSION OF THE STR
POSITIONED TO THE NORTH.

Best guide at this stage is CWB's track. They're pretty reliable at 24hrs.
North of the eye is always dangerous in a big one, so Taipei will get serious impact. Looks like it will crank up around 4-5pm.

You can see the high extending to the north of the typhoon - cutting off the pass - it's still a matter of how far it extends.

And it's only July.

The face of things to come?

There's a whole lotta precipitation feeding into this storm - luckily it's moving fairly fast but it's packing some oomph.

Nepartak was a July storm. Similar scenario - a few years without a big hit then it jumped straight out of the blocks in 2016.

Last minute duck south! Poor old Hualien is gonna cop another disaster. Ilan county will still get blasted, Taipei too, but not the full-brunt.

Appears to be going up Taroka Gorge. Seems typhoons will often look for 'entry points' once they get close to the coast, such as big rivers. That coast is bloody rugged, so Taroka Gorge is the path of least resistance. It becomes a kind of over-ride of the other steering mechanisms

I'm not sure if that's an actual thing, but i've seen it a bunch of times. If it is, how does it 'know'. The eye needs water to generate power, so it makes sense that way, but why does it want to do that? It's not an animal with a survival instinct - or is it?

EDIT: so much for that theory - it's continuing to track south - it's already gone past Hualien city & the eye still hasn't made landfall. Is there a potential loop coming?

cwb radar - check out the 3hr track - it's quite erratic - not predicted by anyone.

While it's making its mind up, it's exposing Hualien county/Ilan county to an extended pounding. Up to 500 mm already in those counties - there's a few hours more of 'extremely torrential' rain still to endure.

And this more southern path will presumably slow it down a bit.

The multi-track shows how every agency got it wrong. JTWC still has it heading to Taipei. If you're 200km out within a few hours of posting your track, that's a serious miscalculation.

Alternative theory: China has perfected typhoon control technology & is decimating the Hualien military bases in preparation for an invasion

Yep, I'd say this is pretty much a direct hit. SW Taiwan is going to get inundated with rain for the next 48 hours.

EDIT: SW Taiwan that is, Kaohsiung, Pingtung.

Well, i right about the loop. In the end, it went through Ilan, where it was supposed to go, but wrong-footed everyone along the way. Would have been a torrid night for anyone between Hulaien & Ilan.

Pingtng always cops it somehow. Up to 1000mm in some places. Ilan was the worst.

Dulan barely got 20mm. If you're south of the eye on the east coast, it's amazing how little effect there can be. There was some fen fong (foehn wind) though.

Flood footage. As it's so mountainous, & the drainage system is good, you don't see a lot of flooding in Taiwan, even in typhoons. But Gaemi managed it. That loop succeeded in dragging out exposure to the worst of it for the south west especially.

https://youtu.be/QoSSeONyFho

Kaohsiung and Pingtung flood, but it takes a lot of rain. That footage looks like a newish area of Kaohsiung, maybe New Zuoying somewhere. All the rain from the mountains is dumping into that area.

I had to abandon my car in a Kaohsiung flood once, near Chengching Lake, an area known for flooding. I was one of those idiots who tried to drive through the high water, and I made it! Until the car crapped out that is. At least I made it through the intersection. Wading waste deep in urban floodwater is a bit unsettling given all the literal shit you know you're wading through.

I'm posting additional videos I find in this folder

Shanshan has been defying predictions for the last couple days. It has now almost stalled just south of the Japan main island, allowing it to increase in strength. I heard on the news this morning that this may be the strongest typhoon to hit Japan in a very long time.

Predictions and forecasts for Shanshan are falling like flies. A day ago every model had Shanshan running straight up Japan. Now, all models disintegrate after 48 hours out or so. This may be one for the books.

I don't think we've seen anything like this in E. Asia in quite a long time. This is a Morakot type event. Apparently there is no strong steering system with competing high pressure fronts to the east and west so it's just floundering.

That behaviour is the recipe for disaster alright. How much rain has fallen do you know?

Turned out to be less destructive than I thought it might be. It dissipated early on. Still, I think some areas got close to 1,000mm over the course of 3-4 days. We're still getting sporadic heavy showers.

This is a very decent-sized typhoon that's going to impact around the northern tip of Hainan, then head into Vietnam.

Not a lot of typhoons make it past Philippines without significant degradation, but Yagi (which just clipped northern ppe) has regained full-strength & looks set to make landfall as a super-typhoon. Places that are not often hit can be more prone to destruction by virtue of not being so battle-hardened. I'd have serious concerns for any communities in Yagi's path.

Reuters is reporting 46 dead & 22 missing in Vietnam, mostly due to flooding or landslides. It also caused extensive destruction to the north eastern manufacturing zone, which has become something of a world factory.

It's still raining there now.

Death toll has jumped to 82, 64 missing.

Imagine if 82 people were killed in the US by a hurricane, what a story it would be.

A major bridge collapse (vid), over Red River in the northern province of Phu Tho, claimed several lives.

Though some guy drove off it on his scooter & survived, apparently.

The number of dead is up to 127, and you're right, if this had happened in the US, this would be much more of an international story than it is. I think you mentioned something in an earlier post about how typhoons and other extreme weather events can have a more catastrophic impact when they hit areas not accustomed to them, and it looks like this is such a case.

Death toll has jumped to 82, 64 missing.

Imagine if 82 people were killed in the US by a hurricane, what a story it would be.

A major bridge collapse (vid), over Red River in the northern province of Phu Tho, claimed several lives.

Though some guy drove off it on his scooter & survived, apparently.

At least 233 dead in Vietnam following Typhoon Yagi's aftermath

Additionally, six people died in northern Thailand.

Six people were killed in Chiang Mai’s Mae Ai district when the heavy rain led to a landslide, according to the Bangkok Post.

This has the potential to bring a lot of rain to Taidong/Hualien/Ilan (actually all the way to Japan) as tracks have it sliding right up the coast. With that trajectory, it will keep feeding rain in over an extended period of time as the rain drifts up from the south from the approaching typhoon, meaning an accumulation effect that will begin days before the typhoon even arrives. Remains to be seen whether it stays off-shore or makes landfall - obviously the closer to the coast, the worse the impact. JTWC has max wind gusts reaching 125kts, which is not massive, but big enough - though it's the rain that will do the damage.

Yep, it's going to be a doozy. This is potentially the worst case scenario for Kaohsiung and Pingtung, with the east coast assured of getting clobbered.

This is quite an unusual path - looks to be coming up through the south of Taiwan, either entering through Pingdong or Kaohsiung. Pingdong always cops the rain, somehow, no matter where the typhoon enters, but it's also set up perfectly to drop large amounts on Taidong & Hualien. Those two counties, which often cop direct hits, don't often get massive precipitation from typhoons, but this is shaping up as a 'reverse-Morakot' (which entered through Hualien & dropped the brunt of its rain-load on Pingdong.) Ilan (& potentially Taipei) will also be in the firing line as it moves northward. Bottom-line is: get those drains dug out if you're on a rural property & consider evacuating if you're in a landslide prone area

Meanwhile, the forecast wind speed has jumped significantly to sustained winds of 120kts & gusts up to 140kts. That's super-typhoon territory, so this is now 'one-with-the-lot'.

The big danger is when it turns the corner beneath Taiwan from a westerly direction to a northerly one. When typhoons make sharp turns, they invariably slow down. When they slow down, that's when rain blasts the same area for a prolonged period. Right when it's at that turning point, a lot of the rain will be aimed at the south to mid east coast.

Places that are getting churned-into now (rain-wise) - Taidong, Hualien, Ilan - are gonna get churned into for the next couple of days - in a potentially escalating fashion. Cheng Gong up to Shih-ti-ping in northern Taidong is currently in the firing zone.

Totals are only (using Taiwan relativism) 150 mm today so far - but that will wind up being 250+ by midnight. Which by itself would be fine - but it's the ramping up from there that does the damage. In terms of landslides - the saturation of the ground primes the possibility up. If that's followed by an intense burst, that's when things start to give.

I'll be interested to see the rain totals in Kaohsiung, Pingdong in terms of the positioning of Krathon. Previously they've been smashed when typhoons enter the mid-east coast as the bands wrap around Taiwan up the strait, then slam into the south-west coast. That's why i'm thinking this might be the reverse of that effect - the rain still wraps around but unloads on the east coast.

Examples of direct eye-hits on Kaohsiung wouldn't be many - for sure it's happened, but i can only vaguely remember 1 or 2. Dan would know better. Southwest (like Ilan/Keelung) always finds a way to get pounded by typhoon rain - but it might be as much with the back-end when it emerges through Hualien as it is with the landfall. The old double-whammy.

Wind-wise, it's gonna be a near-record-level lashing in Kaohsiung - that seems clear.

This version of the windy website on CWB (now CWA) shows the 'wrap-around effect' in full swing. Funny how the wind finds a way - some of it is cutting straight across central Taiwan (the path you'd expect it to take in a roughly circular typhoon shape), but a lot of it is taking the long way around to get a smoother path across water whilst still rotating around the eye of the storm. This also allows it to keep picking up moisture.

There's even an eddy forming within the overall structure off the coast of Miaoli in the north west that's got it's own thing going.

As the image suggests, it's the east coast that's continuing to cop the brunt of the rain - already up to 300mm in the south today. That's only gonna intensify in the next couple of days.

Meanwhile, there's virtually no rain in Kaohsiung, so far. That will change obviously, but it's still getting protection from the central range at this stage.

Currently, there's a serious looking band of rain pouring into Dulan, Dong He. That could be one of the torrential bursts that starts moving mountains.

This scenario playing out, is what i'd guessed was the only way Taidong could ever get hit with the big 1000+ mil totals - a typhoon stalling just south of Taiwan. It's the only position where the rain pay-load winds up unleashing on the south-east coast - quite rare.

Three day accumulative totals are already 1000+ for some areas south of Taidong City. A lot of that is military land, so it's not making the news yet i guess, but it's creeping north - Beinan is 900+ for three days, Chihben has had 350+ just today. Tonight will likely escalate.

CWA does have Taidong on the (only in Taiwan) Extremely Torrential rain warning level

Then it's still not going anywhere fast tomorrow. It's shaping up as a freak, dangerous event.

Check out this path - so loitering - like a naughty child that doesn't want to come in from play-time. CWA's 24hr track is usually accurate, but looking at the radar, it would still seem some chance of sneaking up the strait.

Then it's still not going anywhere fast tomorrow. It's shaping up as a freak, dangerous event.

Freak, dangerous event to be sure. We never had something like this the whole time we lived in the Kaohsiung-Pingtung area.

Where are you getting the 3 day cumulative rain readings?

3-day rainfall accumulation

https://www.cwa.gov.tw/V8/E/W/OBS_Top.html

(CWA - Weather tab - Top 10 Today)

Have a feeling this is gonna be a bigger story by tomorrow morning.

There's a crazy new typhoon rule in Taiwan now - if one county has a typhoon day off then they all have it. In northern Taiwan there's no real impact today, but businesses are closed. That must be annoying for business owners.

Krathon seems to have taken a very short detour to the east or even southeast. It's path and speed have been quite erratic.

Thanks for the link!

Here we go. Dong-gang in Pingdong has experienced 160mm in the last hour! That's nearly as high as it gets as an hourly rate - nowhere can sustain that intensity for long without landslides.

Still pouring on the east coast (south & north, but not mid), but now Kaohsiung & Pingdong are coming into play as the eye makes landfall.

As you say, it did duck east just before it crept ashore - it was forecast to go to Tainan but seems to have crossed right over Kaohsiung city after all.

Be interesting to see where the exit wound ends up being. Erratic behaviour traversing the mountains is not uncommon.

The stairway to Kaohsiung ...
We won't see that track too many times - perfectly picked the gap between Taiwan & PPE then comes up through southern Taiwan - most of it at snail's pace.

There's always a blocking high involved in these stalling situations.

This was forecast as a surfer's delight typhoon (sliding north far enough off-shore to produce epic waves without the wind/safety restrictions kicking in), but some of the latest models have it veering west, colliding with Taipei.

It's a good sized storm, gusts up to 130kts (which may well rise). It would be very late in the season for Taiwan to record a direct hit (Oct 31 to Nov 1), but not beyond precedent. The year before Nari became the biggest flooding typhoon in 200 years, there was a typhoon on Nov 1 that was the then-biggest flooding typhoon in 100 years.

The 'veer-south' correction has strengthened - it's now forecast to hit around Hualien, & could still wind up lower than that. A lot of the east coast was saturated by the last typhoon so it's all primed to go so far as landslides are concerned. Max wind gusts have crept up to 145kts (sustained at 115) which is around the cat-4 mark.

I may have slightly over-predicted the impacts of Krathon on the south east coast, but it did dump 1000+mm of rain there, now this is shaping-up as a double-whammy effect.

There were also heavy rains caused by Trami that went south a few days ago, which did cause landslides - the soil couldn't be more saturated. A directish hit from a serious typhoon is not what you need right now.

Two days ago it was forecast to pass harmlessly out to sea off the east coast. Once the model/algorithms start correcting themselves, they rarely do it one leap - it's invariably a gradual pendulum-swing thing, though we're probably getting towards the southerly limits of that arc right now. It's currently aimed directly at Taitung City.

According to the Weather Charts, the sub-tropical-ridge (High north of Taiwan) has built in hard, pushing Kong-rey west. But: a cold-front is meant to open up a weakness in the ridge, into which Kong-rey will slip through to accomplish every low pressure's goal - head towards the nearest pole.

The net result of that could be the track splits Taiwan up the spine as it travels north. Apart from the Taitung impact, that's a path that can also cause massive accumulated rain in the north.

Well, Kong-rey is shaping up to be one monster of a storm. It looks like it's moving pretty quickly, but Taiwan is in for it this time, particularly given the saturated status of the ground as you point out. The fact that it's forecast to do a u-ey and track NE after passing over Taiwan is concerning. The entire island is likely co cop some of this.

Kong-rey is not the perfect storm (going too fast, re current forecasts), though gusting up to 165kts (305km!!!) ... it's a bloody good one. Thing is, it's coming as Taitung's crowning act in The Perfect Season.

1000+ mil from Krathon, another drenching from Trami just a week ago, now a direct hit from: Super Typhoon Kong-rey.

Winds: incredible - Cat 5. Major destruction territory.

Rain: Heavy already, (for Taitung) but in terms of the eye-wall rush-hours, shortish (a few hours) but very, very sharp - landslide triggering sharp.

The sat-image indicates an extremely torrential body of rain in a thick central structure.
It doesn't have a massive feed-in trailing it, & it's moving quite fast .. supposedly. Typhoons do funny things when they hit mountains.

Predicted to re-curve gang-gang hao in the Taiwan Strait. Which will allow it to maintain some strength - enough to dump its payload of rain on the way out the door.

As normal, it will be the whole east coast & then Kaohsiung-Pingtung in the second act.

Don't wanna be alarmist - but - doing my DIY algorithim thing - Taitung east coast is currently rated as: historically high risk of catastrophic impacts

Here's Xang-sane's track, the insane rain typhoon at the end of October in 2000 that caused massive flooding in northern Taiwan.

Xang-sane, sfaik, is the last typhoon to make landfall in Taiwan this late in the year. The paths are not that dissimilar. Kong-rey is way more powerful wind-wise, though.

Looking at the current rainfall data, Kong-rey's biggest impact so far is in Taipei, Shilin/Beitou. What's biggest on approach can be a sign of where the heaviest shit is heading. As was the case with Xang-sane, it's the chimney stack effect where it feeds in for days that does the damage.

The north east does have the dong-bei-ji cold-front coming into play as well, which can be an explosive interaction in terms of rain.

Latest track has Kong-rey's eye going right over the Dulan Sugar Factory.

Trend continues for biggest rain in the north - up to 500 mil in downtown Taipei as Kong-rey starts to make its presence felt.

Meanwhile in Spain (Valencia), insane scenes as flooding turns streets into walled canals. At least Taiwan is geared-up for massive rain, but below is what happens in countries that are not. Up to 100 dead & that will likely rise.

Large eye made landfall right over Dulan around 2.30pm - again - second bulls-eye in consecutive seasons. Wind was the thing, rather than rain in Taitung.

Damage to Sugar Factory roof by midday - the one that was replaced after last year's super typhoon. Whatever happened to normal typhoons? It's like the weather has been hijacked by Marvel.

Rain: Still coming down at 100 mil an hour in some places as of 4.20pm. Biggest falls in mountainous areas of Ilan & Hualien. Curiously Taichung city is 3rd with 600 mil.

Seems incredible, & would break all kinds of records, but there's another potential typhoon on the horizon that could impact Taiwan in a week's time.

There's no real mystery to the lateness of this season - Dan would testify to that by the extended heat in Japan. If the ocean stays warm enough, there will be typhoons.

There's no real mystery to the lateness of this season - Dan would testify to that by the extended heat in Japan. If the ocean stays warm enough, there will be typhoons.

As of last weekend, there was still no visible snow on Mt. Fuji. Every day it goes without a snowcap sets a new record.

There's no real mystery to the lateness of this season - Dan would testify to that by the extended heat in Japan. If the ocean stays warm enough, there will be typhoons.

As of last weekend, there was still no visible snow on Mt. Fuji. Every day it goes without a snowcap sets a new record.

Speaking of records, i wonder how many times there have been 4 active systems in the NW Pacific in mid-Nov.

That is bizarre. Fuji did finally get a snowcap, I think 4-5 days ago.

It looks like Guam might get some of that action.

Amazingly, it looks like two storms are going to impact Taiwan in the coming days.

This is, almost certainly, the latest typhoon (Nov 15) to ever make landfall in Taiwan since records were kept. Not gonna be big winds, but it's in 'position A' to once again inundate a saturated se coast with torrential rain. I don't know how many hits that area can take - seems we're finding out in real time.