My Typhoon Lawin Experience

  “Millions of lives were changed in a day by a cruel and wasteful storm” (George W. Bush).   Typhoon Haima , known in the Philippines as Super Typhoon Lawin , was the third most intense tropical cyclone worldwide in 2016. It was the twenty-second named storm and the eleventh typhoon of the annual typhoon season . Impacting the Philippines less than 3 days after Typhoon Sarika , Haima formed out of a tropical disturbance southwest of Chuuk on October 14, it developed into a tropical storm the next day.   Steady strengthening occurred over the next day or two as it tracked westward towards the Philippines. After forming an eye shortly after it was upgraded to a typhoon, Haima began to rapidly strengthen and eventually became a super typhoon on October 18. It later attained its peak intensity as a Category 5-equivalent tropical cyclone before weakening slightly. Haima later made landfall late on October 19 as a Category 4-equivalent storm. Rapid weakening ...