Former Tropical Storm Mekkhala strengthened to a typhoon over the Western North Pacific Ocean east of Luzon on Saturday night.\u00a0 At 5:00 a.m. EDT on Sunday the center of Typhoon Mekkhala was located at latitude 16.4\u00b0N and longitude 131.3\u00b0E which put the center about 710 miles (1145 km) east-southeast of Aparri, Philippines.\u00a0 Mekkhala was moving toward the northwest at 14 m.p.h. (22 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 75 m.p.h. (120 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 90 m.p.h. (145 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 988 mb.<\/p>\n
Former Tropical Storm Mekkhala strengthened to a typhoon on Saturday night.\u00a0 The inner end of a rainband wrapped around the southern side of Mekkhala’s circulation.\u00a0 Other bands of showers and thunderstorms were revolving around the center of Typhoon Mekkhala.\u00a0 Storms near the center of Mekkhala generated upper level divergence that pumped mass away from the typhoon.\u00a0 The removal of mass caused the surface pressure to decrease.<\/p>\n
The strongest winds were occurring in the northern side of Typhoon Mekkhala.\u00a0 Winds to typhoon force extended out 25 miles (40 km) in the northern half of Mekkhala’s circulation.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out 105 miles (165 km) in the northern side of Typhoon Mekkhala.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force only extended out 40 miles (65 km) in the southern half of Mekkhala’s circulation.<\/p>\n
Typhoon Mekkhala will move through an environment favorable for intensification during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 Mekkhala will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperatures are near 30\u00b0C.\u00a0 It will move under the southern part of an upper level ridge that is southwest of Japan. The upper level ridge will produce easterly winds that will blow toward the top of Mekkhala\u2019s circulation.\u00a0 Those winds will cause some vertical wind shear.\u00a0 The vertical wind shear will inhibit intensification, but the wind shear will not be enough to prevent intensification.\u00a0 Typhoon Mekhala will intensify during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 Mekkhala could strengthen to the equivalent of a major hurricane during the next few days.<\/p>\n
Typhoon Mekkhala will move around the southwestern part of a high pressure system over the Western North Pacific Ocean.\u00a0 The high pressure system will steer Mekkhala toward the west-northwest during the next 24 hours.\u00a0 On its anticipated track, Typhoon Mekkhala will move toward northern Luzon.\u00a0 Mekkhala is likely to move more slowly in a couple of days when it reaches the western end of the high pressure system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Former Tropical Storm Mekkhala strengthened to a typhoon over the Western North Pacific Ocean east of Luzon on Saturday night.\u00a0 At 5:00 a.m. EDT on Sunday the center of Typhoon Mekkhala was located at latitude 16.4\u00b0N and longitude 131.3\u00b0E which put the center about 710 miles (1145 km) east-southeast of Aparri, Philippines.\u00a0 Mekkhala was moving […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5],"tags":[453,1817,103,2130,64,2129,454],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24562"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24562"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24562\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24563,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24562\/revisions\/24563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}