Climate change makes Super Typhoon Mawar more dangerous

Mawar: A Super Typhoon in the Marianas. Is it a Triple Threat for a Large, Massive, Multi-Centrifugal Storm?

“Mawar is forecast to intensify slowly over the next few days, possibly becoming a Super Typhoon over the Philippine Sea well west of the Marianas,” the NWS said.

The ocean soaks up most of the extra heat that is trapped near the Earth’s surface by human emissions of greenhouse gasses. Mawar was large and powerful thanks to the fuel in the ocean waters. As the storm approached Guam and the Mariana Islands on Tuesday, the National Weather Service described Mawar as a “triple threat” with powerful winds, torrential rain and “life-threatening storm surge.”

Mawar gained strength as it moved toward land. In just one day, it went from a Category 1 storm, with winds that might remove a few shingles, to a Category 4 storm with winds powerful enough to tear away roofs entirely.

It’s increasingly common for rapid intensification. And storms that gain strength quickly can be extremely dangerous because there is less time to warn people in harm’s way. Last year, Hurricane Ian ballooned into a devastatingly powerful storm shortly before hitting Florida. Hurricane Ida gained strength before hitting Louisiana.

Typhoons are the same thing as hurricanes and cyclones. Different regions of the world use different words for the spinning storms. The term Super typhoon is related to Major Hurricane. It refers to storms with very strong winds.

A hotter Earth makes rain more likely, because a warming atmosphere can hold more water. All that water Vapor falls as rain when a storm hits land. Climate change has been shown to cause storms to drop more rain.

Climate change makes both storm surge and inland flooding more severe. Sea level rise makes storm surge more dangerous. The damage to the coastline from storm surge is made worse by the higher water along the coast. Guam and the Mariana Islands are especially vulnerable to rising seas because they are low-lying island territories.

I’m looking out my window and I see a lot of waves in the bay which is normally a very calm bay. The trees are losing branches. There are coconut trees.

The Guam Storm Is Coming: Suppressing Typhoons, Floods, and a Hurricane in Washington, D.C.

He grew up in Guam but now works in Washington, D.C. She is in the midst of a work trip that will allow her to be at home for the category 4 storm.

It brought 140mph winds and forecasts of a 25-foot storm surge, knocking out power throughout the island. The U.S. island territory has been hit by storms in the past.

“I was in middle school [in 2002], and I was still a kid. My mom took care of all of that and I was unaware of the level of responsibility and fear that would come from preparing for a typhoon. She said her mom kept her safe.

A complete assessment of the damage will take more time as Guam is still under flash flood warnings. But Gov. Lou Leon Guerrero told Morning Edition that she knows of at least one rescue mission in which eight people were taken to a shelter.

“There is a lot of uncertainty about the fate of the island around us,” said Shelton, the senator from Guam.

Shelton braced for the storm while staying in the northern part of the island. She told NPR that she was thankful that President Joe Biden signed off on the state of emergency request and that the island has both local and federal emergency responders ready.

“As soon as we are safe for us to leave, we have folks here on the ground ready to respond,” he said.

“I think that’s one positive thing to look at throughout the next several hours,” she said, before the storm hit. “We’re together, and we’re able to pray together and wait out the storm together and help in any way that we can.”

While waiting out the storm, the hotel Swaddell was staying at moved guests to a ballroom farther from any windows. The guests were sharing a meal as the wind blew outside.

Guam is not a State but a Powerful, Dependent System for Emergency Management in the Light of a Possible Tema-Relief Storm

That process likely won’t start until sunrise at the earliest. Forecasters tell the AP and the New York Times that storm conditions are expected to linger in Guam until Thursday morning local time.

She says that they get more support because they don’t have the help of other states.

That positions FEMA to help with damage assessment and recovery as quickly as possible, Bink says. Since Guam is a territory and isn’t a state, it doesn’t affect the relief effort since it’s not a state.

That’s the reason we have a distribution center there. And that’s why a regional administrator meets with … island leadership every year to make sure that … efforts made to prepare for disasters and be resilient against them are shared,” she explains. “In fact, Guam has mostly concrete infrastructure, including concrete power poles, and that can go a long way in the face of a storm of this magnitude.”

The NWS said the storm moved away from the island as of Wednesday evening. As it slowly makes its way northwest, the maximum winds remain at 140 mph.

The storm could be the most powerful to hit the island in 60 years, with forecasters saying it could cause life threatening storm surge.

As soon as the winds start abating, she’ll have her first damage assessment, but already knows about the damage to houses and one rescue mission where eight people were taken to a shelter.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/05/24/1177847305/guam-typhoon-mawar-damage-fema-relief

Guam is in the dark: An update on the island’s power system and the U.S. Embassy and Interior Secretary Xi Jinping

What’s clear is that most of the island is in the dark. Guam Power Authority said in an afternoon update that almost all of its circuits were without power, and that the island-wide power system was serving only about 1,000 of its approximately 52,000 customers.

Williams told Morning Edition that there was heavy rain,coastal flooding, high seas, downed trees and internet outages on the island.

She explained that this is not comparable to Florida, where you could drive inland 10 miles or drive to Georgia. The flights ceased to operate yesterday. We’re here. Staying in our homes, going to places with shelter, and not driving are some of the things we have to do. Most people do that.

Federal officials had also acted quickly — the U.S. military sent ships away from Guam as a precaution, while President Biden approved an emergency declaration on Tuesday authorizing the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to respond to the disaster.

FEMA has prepared more than a million liters of water and 500,000 meals at a distribution center, along with 100 staff members, including doctors and power restoration experts, Anne Bink told NPR on Tuesday.