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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
 Posted - 08/01/2012 : 04:40:23
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. . . Assuming South-East Asia is your locale.
I began writing this off-line, using my laptop's battery. There was no power in Baguio. Typhoon Saola, the center of which missed going directly over the Philippines, was last night (when I still had access to the Internet) was headed very slowly toward Taiwan. That's the problem: Its center is almost stalled just to the north. The typhoon is so large that it's enhancing the monsoon systems far to the south, its outer bands sucking huge storm cells out of the South China Sea and onto Luzon. Norther Luzon is being walloped with wind and torrential rain.
Rain has been massive here, flooding one part of Baguio, City Camp, up to the second story of buildings. Power has been out twice for hours each time today.
If I'm absent and anyone is wondering what happened to me, check this URL. Back off the scale a couple of ticks, so you can see the geographic context. On the sidebar there, check Satellite, IR4, and Animate. The big swirly thing is Typhoon Saola, and the big tail it's dragging from the south-west is the weather it's pulling into its maw. That tail is probably producing more rain than the rest of Saola combined.
Almost certainly, this is the most rain I've ever experienced, even in earlier direct hits by super-typhoons.
We (my mate, myself, her 7-year-old niece, the nanny/relative, the niece/law student and Foxi the Askal dog) are all hunkered down and very safe at home.
Edit: Just got this from the news: 242 mm, or over 9-1/2 inches of rain have fallen here in the last two days.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
Edited by - HalfMooner on 08/01/2012 06:31:31
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13477 Posts |
Posted - 08/01/2012 : 07:45:26 [Permalink]
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| Wow! And here in Southern California, if it drizzles the news organizations go into Storm Watch mode. |
Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.
Why not question something for a change?
Genetic Literacy Project |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/01/2012 : 09:22:06 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Kil
Wow! And here in Southern California, if it drizzles the news organizations go into Storm Watch mode.
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I remember that. It was always a big deal in San Diego, where I grew up, if the San Diego River flowed at all.
I've just read that there have been more than twenty mudslides on roads in the Cordilleras, and that two people, an old lady, and a teen boy on a motorcycle (riding with two others who survived) were killed in separate slides. And the City Camp neighborhood of Baguio is under evacuation orders, with no known fatalities there. My mate Rose lived there a couple of years ago, when there was a similar flood. She and several others had to clamber from roof to roof to escape the flood.
Though it's still raining hard here, the satellite images now make it appear the worst of Saola may be past for us in the Philippines. The center of the typhoon looks to be hitting Taipei very soon. |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 08/01/2012 10:00:53 |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/01/2012 : 23:21:21 [Permalink]
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Here's a bit of news coverage of Saola. It seems about 23 people were killed by the typhoon in the Philippines as it dropped 1.5 meters (1.5 feet) here since last week thus far. And it's already dumped 1.7 meters (5.6 feet) of rain in parts of Taiwan.
Today, still nearly constant light rain here, interrupted by heavy downpours. |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 08/01/2012 23:21:52 |
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie
USA
4826 Posts |
Posted - 08/02/2012 : 05:59:26 [Permalink]
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Mooner,
If a little guy comes around looking for gopher wood, you might want to consider following him and helping him build something.  |
Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils
Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/02/2012 : 09:42:24 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Valiant Dancer
Mooner,
If a little guy comes around looking for gopher wood, you might want to consider following him and helping him build something.
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Will do! Anyway. I've long wanted to know just what kind of wood that was, if you noah what I mean. |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 08/02/2012 09:49:32 |
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie
USA
4826 Posts |
Posted - 08/03/2012 : 05:55:34 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by HalfMooner
Originally posted by Valiant Dancer
Mooner,
If a little guy comes around looking for gopher wood, you might want to consider following him and helping him build something.
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Will do! Anyway. I've long wanted to know just what kind of wood that was, if you noah what I mean.
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Well, the guy kept telling his kids, "gopher wood". |
Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils
Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/03/2012 : 11:18:50 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Valiant Dancer
Originally posted by HalfMooner
Originally posted by Valiant Dancer
Mooner,
If a little guy comes around looking for gopher wood, you might want to consider following him and helping him build something.
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Will do! Anyway. I've long wanted to know just what kind of wood that was, if you noah what I mean.
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Well, the guy kept telling his kids, "gopher wood".
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Gopher is really too weak a wood with which to build an Ark. As the 442nd Regimental Combat Team observed in their unit's motto: "Gopher Broke!" |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/14/2012 : 00:28:32 [Permalink]
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Tropical storm Kai-Tek is now beginning to make landfall as it moves onto Luzon from the Philippine Sea. It's not "organized" enough to be a typhoon, but it's huge. By tomorrow, its center will likely be over us here in Baguio. Though the rain is now nearly constant and heavy, my wi-fi Internet connection is holding up so far. But I don't expect it to keep working all this day, and almost certainly not tomorrow, as the center of the storm seems to be coming right at us.
There are now over 200 dead, mostly in Mega Manila, and that was even before Kai-Tek hit Luzon. This new storm will doubtless make conditions even deadlier.
I will try to find some secular aid agencies for people to donate to. Even a little money goes very far here. The Filipino Freethinkers (many of them from the large University of the Philippines chapter) are doing a great deal of volunteer work to help people displaced by the floods. Their slogan: "Two hands working do more than a thousand clasped in prayer." The FF suggest people donate to the Philippine Red Cross. |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 08/14/2012 00:29:45 |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2012 : 00:02:49 [Permalink]
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We're at "Signal 2" alert here in Baguio.
Both the local forecasting agency, PAGASA as well as The US military's Joint Typhoon Warning Center have been sitting back on the laurels of their powerful and usually friggin' brilliant computer models in tracking tropical storm Kai-Tek (called Helen by PAGASA). These models are usually uncannily accurate. They called for Kai-Tek to swing close to the eastern coast of northern Luzon, then take a sharp turn to the north-west and pass through the Philippine Strait between Luzon and Taiwan.
I just didn't trust that the storm would make that turn. And if it didn't, it would squarely hit both norther Luzon and Manila. I felt confirmed in my doubts during the last couple of days as Kai-Tek continued to miss each plotted turning point, and the forecasters would plot yet another (and even sharper) turn ever closer to Luzon. I warned my "impromtpu family" to be prepared.
Last night, indeed (even as the storm was coming ashore), PAGASA even cancelled a flood alert for Manila. At that time, I could see on satellite animation that the storm was going to hit that city within minutes. Today, PAGASA has reissued that flood warning. With hundreds already dead from previous flooding, I wonder how many additional people have died because the flood warning was withdrawn before people went to bed.
Hurricane tracking software is amazing. I've seen tracks plotted in advance with very detailed jigs and jags for thousands of kilometers, then seen typhoons follow those paths as though they were on a guided tour. But even so, computer models can only approximate reality. They attempt to predict what a truly chaotic phenomenon of nature will do. Forecasters will still have to use their own brains and at least consider the possibility that s storm just might continue in the direction it's headed, rather than the route the computer says it will go.
To be fair, the center of Kai-Tek's rotation is much closer to where the forecasters said the storm would be than is most of the storm itself. It's not a symmetrical storm by any means. Most of the storm itself is spread out to the south and east of Kai-Tek's "center." But even that center itself has not "obeyed" the computer models very closely.
Here's a link to news about what Kai-Tek is doing to the Philippines. |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2012 : 01:47:17 [Permalink]
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| south east asia is my locale, but we don't get any typhoons here. I think the Philippines takes the brunt of all the pacific storms. |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2012 : 02:06:01 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
south east asia is my locale, but we don't get any typhoons here. I think the Philippines takes the brunt of all the pacific storms.
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Indeed. The Philippines lies directly in the natural path of typhoons coming west from the Pacific, and is near the general area where most of them turn northward to follow the East Asian coast.
Are you in a more equatorial country, OffC? |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2012 : 02:16:23 [Permalink]
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| yes, i am in east malaysia |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2012 : 03:10:01 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
yes, i am in east malaysia
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Ah, Sarawak or Sabah? |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 08/15/2012 03:39:42 |
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On fire for Christ
SFN Regular
Norway
1273 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2012 : 06:15:21 [Permalink]
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| Neither. Labuan. |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 08/15/2012 : 09:19:18 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by On fire for Christ
Neither. Labuan.
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The island that Raja Brooke gave to the British? Is it a Malaysian state separate from Sabah and Sarawak? |
“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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Local weather update . . .
