Super Typhoon Yagi hits Vietnam after killing two in China

Here’s a real typhoon for you in the South China Sea. Blew up into a Category 4, near Category 5, strength hurricane as it hit Hainan. Overturning cars. Lot of damage.

Here’s a real typhoon for you

Are there imaginary ones?

Have you read half of the books ever written on typhoons?

Looked it up, and apparently a Super Typhoon is comparable to what we know as a category 5 Hurricane.....the worst of the worst.

The article I was reading said that the most catastrophic Super Typhoon was called Bhola, and struck East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, in 1970. There were 300,000 casualties. Hard to imagine such destruction. I suspect the low altitude of Bangladesh, plus the lack of weather satellites in those days, contributed to the high death toll.

The first successful weather satellite, TIROS-1, operated for 78 days, and was launched in 1960. NASA started the first comprehensive weather observation system with the Nimbus satellites, but transferred those duties to NOAA, The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Admistration, in 1970. NOAA's purpose was the "bettor protection of life and property from natural hazards.....for a better understanding of the total environment..." The cost of NOAA is born by the US. It is hard to overstate the importance of early warning for typhoons.

Back in my days with the USAF in the 1970s I helped to launch a lot of low earth orbit satellites, so I find this subject particularly interesting.