Supertyphoon Bopha Bearing Down on Palau

An exceptionally low-latitude tropical cyclone formed a few days ago around 2 degrees north latitude, well southwest of Pohnpei. It became a tropical storm around 3 degrees north and a typhoon around 4 degrees north. Now, at 6 degrees north it is a supertyphoon with 130 kt. sustained winds, and is about to pass directly over the small island nation of Palau in about 12 hours.

This is not an area accustomed to major typhoons. From what I've been able to read most of the houses are wood framed with tin roofs. Also from reading a couple blogs it would seem that almost no preparations are being done, which is not surprising since typhoons are so rare down there. It is looking like the most populous island, Koror, may see the worst of the storm as they could be in the right side of the eyewall. Hopefully everyone can get to a safe place but I'm fearing a major disaster could occur.

After Bopha clears Palau it looks like the Philippines are next in line, probably in around 48 to 60 hours. Landfall looks to be in extreme northern Mindanao or the Visayas, probably as about a 115 kt. typhoon. After that it will obviously depend on how much land it crosses how strong it will be leaving the Philippines but it is still progged to be a typhoon as it moves into the South China Sea in about 4 days.

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