Strongest typhoon for 30 years slams into Hainan by Dan Corbett
Whilst Hurricane Rita has been making the news, Typhoon Damrey has being doing its worst across in Asia.
With sustained winds of 125 mph (200 km/h), Typhoon Damrey hit southern China’s island province of Hainan late Sunday evening UK time. The winds put Damrey into Category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale, the same as Hurricane Rita when it made landfall on the Texas-Louisiana border on Saturday.
China’s Xinua News Agency said that the country’s 18th typhoon of the year was the worst to strike Hainan province for 30 years. It is said to have dwarfed all previous typhoons recorded on the island since 1960 except for one, Typhoon No. 7314, in 1973.
Having already caused flooding in the Philippines last week as it passed by as a tropical storm, Damrey prompted the evacuations of thousands from Hainan province. Rice fields have been flooded and the winds have devastated crops such as fruit and rubber trees. Two deaths have so far been reported and power has been cut to most of the island. Damrey’s winds and torrential rain stretched as far as Hong Kong, some 350 miles (560 km) to the northeast.
As of 7am UK time Monday, Damrey’s centre was just about to pass into the Gulf of Tonkin, between Hainan and Vietnam. Sustained wind speeds have dropped to 75 mph (120 km/h) but with a lot of rain yet to fall, Vietnam’s authorities are taking no chances. 150,000 people are being evacuated from the flood-prone country’s coasts as Damrey approaches, and 50,000 others are being mobilised to reinforce sea defences and dykes. Damrey is expected to make landfall again on Tuesday, before weakening quickly and dissipating over Laos.
Eyes will then turn to Longwang, a tropical storm currently sitting to the south of Iwo Jima in the northwest Pacific. Though it is too early to say where Longwang will make landfall, if at all, the Japanese Ryuku islands will be keeping a close eye. Only about a month ago the islands were visited by Typhoon Nabi before it made landfall on Japan’s southern main islands of Kyushu, and current forecasts have Longwang taking a similar path.
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