Wipha gained a bit more strength than forecast yesterday and passed just south of Hong Kong during the day today (China time, overnight US time), becoming a 140kph typhoon as opposed to the 100kph tropical storm that was forecast:
That caused the damage estimate to triple to about $1.5 Billion USD, mostly due to disruption as damage should be mostly light. However, there is so much stuff in the Hong Kong/Shenzhen/Macao/Yangjiang corridor even light damage and disruption can quickly add up. Almost 98 million people might experience tropical storm force winds or greater. Here is some video via AP …
Next up will be a second landfall on the Leizhou Peninsula, then across the Gulf of Tonkin and a third landfall on the Vietnamese coast at just below typhoon strength (although it might regain typhoon status).
Elsewhere, NHC is watching two disturbances, one in the Atlantic and one in the East Pacific. Neither look very threatening at the moment, conditions are not great for either to spin up.
