[Vision2020] Ketsana Devastates Manilla With Record Rain (13.4 in. in 6 hrs, over 140 dead, 450, 000 displaced), Now Aiming At Hue, Vietnam

[Ted Moffett]

Assuming the intensity and frequency of extreme precipitation (including
record snowfall) events (and other destructive climate change impacts) will
increase as global warming progresses, we should be assessing the economic
and human costs of our fossil fuel emissions impacts on climate, not as
externalities, but included in the economic equations addressing emissions
reduction schemes.  Of course, directly linking anthropogenic warming to any
one extreme precipitation event is questionable; but when the global
frequency and intensity of precipitation events increases, and loading of
the atmosphere with more moisture due to increased evaporation from oceans
is predicted by climate science models, as temperature increases, a science
based trend is suggested.

Ketsana's predicted path towards Hue, Vietnam, as it increases to a Cat. 1
typhoon, from US Naval Oceanography Portal, Joint Typhoon Warning Center:

http://www.usno.navy.mil/NOOC/nmfc-ph/RSS/jtwc/warnings/wp1709.gif

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Information on Ketsana's impact on the Philippines:

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1333

>From website above:

The Philippine Islands continue to count the dead in the wake of the
catastrophe left by Tropical Storm
Ketsana<http://www.wunderground.com/tropical/tracking/wp200917.html>on
Saturday. Hard-hit was the capital of
Manila<http://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/RPLL/2009/9/26/DailyHistory.html>,
where the 16.7 inches of rain that fell in just 12 hours set a record for
the heaviest 1-day rainfall ever recorded in the city (previous record: 13.2
inches in 24 hours, set in June 1967). In the six hours between 8am and 2pm
local time on the 25th, Manila recorded 13.4 inches of rain--over 2.2 inches
per hour. There rainfall rates were observable via satellite observations
from NASA's TRMM satellite, well in advance of when the storm made landfall
in the Philippines (Figure 2). The TRMM satellite showed a small core of
heavy rain in excess of 1.6 inches per hours near the center of Ketsana, and
this core moved directly over the city of Manila.
The flooding from Ketsana's rains was the worst in at least 42 years in
Manila, and President Gloria Arroyo called Ketsana "a once-in-a-lifetime
typhoon". At least 140 people are dead, 32 missing, and up to 450,000
homeless from the flooding in the Philippines.

Ketsana is not finished yet. The typhoon has begun a period of rapid
intensification, and is now on the verge of attaining Category 2 typhoon
status as it approaches a Tuesday landfall in Vietnam. Ketsana's heavy rains
and high winds could exact a high toll in Vietnam.
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Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett
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