Super Typhoon Yagi update: Vietnam orders evacuations, closes airports as powerful storm makes landfall

Benjamin Horton, director of the Earth Observatory of Singapore, said storms like Typhoon Yagi were “increasing in strength due to climate change, mainly because warmer oceans are giving storms more energy, which in turn leads to faster wind speeds and more rainfall.”

Climate change is also causing storms to move to different locations, with weather station studies showing the latitude at which storms reach their peak intensity is shifting, bringing new areas closer to being affected, he added.

Protecting natural systems from coral reefs to rivers, as well as building structures that are more resistant to high winds and flying debris and improving existing infrastructure are all measures that can help countries better cope with powerful typhoons, Houghton said.

Shocking footage shows Typhoon Yagi, one of the region’s strongest storms in a decade, making landfall in northern Vietnam on Saturday afternoon.

Video footage showed strong winds causing glass to be ripped off the building.

Scientists say climate change is causing ocean temperatures to rise and making storms more powerful.

Last week, Typhoon Shanshan battered southwestern Japan, bringing the strongest winds in decades.

A study from Imperial College London found that Xiang Shan has likely been intensified by climate change. Researchers found that Xiang Shan’s maximum wind speeds have increased by 7.5% as the climate warms.

The study warns that such powerful storms will become more frequent in the future, potentially reaching nearly six times a decade.

Most of the major storms in recent years have been found to be exacerbated by rising temperatures: Heat in the oceans is known to intensify tropical storms such as typhoons and hurricanes, and ocean temperatures in recent years have been the warmest on record.

Below are some commonly used weather terms and their definitions, adapted from the National Weather Service.

Hurricane or typhoon — A warm-core tropical cyclone with minimum sustained surface winds of 74 mph (119 kph) or more. Hurricanes form east of the International Date Line and typhoons form west of the date line. In the Indian Ocean and Australia, they are known as cyclones.

Super typhoon — A typhoon with maximum sustained surface wind speeds of 150 miles per hour (241 km/h) or greater.

Tornado — A column of violently rotating air that usually originates from a cumulonimbus cloud and hangs down to touch the ground. Locally, it is the most destructive of all atmospheric phenomena. Tornadoes can strike from any direction, but in the United States they most often move from the southwest to the northeast. They are measured on an F-scale ranging from EF0 to EF5, which takes into account 28 types of damage to buildings and trees. EF2 and above are considered severe tornadoes.

Vietnam said it had evacuated more than 50,000 people from coastal towns and deployed 450,000 troops.

It also suspended operations at four airports for several hours on Saturday, with more than 300 flights cancelled at Hanoi’s Noi Bai airport, the northern region’s busiest.

High schools were also closed in 12 northern provinces, including the capital Hanoi, which has a population of 8.5 million.

Authorities in the capital suspended public transport on Saturday afternoon, including buses and two subway lines, state media said, and the meteorological agency warned of the risk of heavy flooding in the city centre.

Nguyen Manh Quang, 40, a Hanoi resident, said: “The wind is so strong that people are likely to fall over,” while Dang Van Huong, also 40, said: “I’ve never seen a storm like this. You can’t drive a car in this wind.”

The typhoon, with maximum sustained winds of 149 kilometres per hour, made landfall in Vietnam’s coastal provinces of Quang Ninh and Hai Phong, state media reported. Local media reported on Saturday that a woman was killed in the capital Hanoi when strong winds toppled trees before the storm made landfall.

Quang Ninh province is home to Halong Bay, a UNESCO World Heritage Site known for its many towering limestone islands. Hundreds of cruises in the popular tourist destination were canceled ahead of the typhoon, local media reported.

Hai Phong is an industrial hub and is home to large factories including electric vehicle maker VinFast and Apple supplier Pegatron. The typhoon also caused power outages in large areas of Quang Ninh and Thai Binh provinces.

As Typhoon Yagi makes landfall in Vietnam, residents of Hanoi are bracing themselves for the force of the storm.

“I will stay home and stay safe with my family,” said Bao Ngoc Cao, 24, a businesswoman from Hanoi.

She added that the last time a typhoon this strong hit Vietnam was in 2013 and the storm usually weakens before reaching the capital, “but we still need to be prepared.”

The hurricane made landfall in the north of the country on Saturday afternoon and has already killed four people.

Typhoon Yagi has passed through the Philippines, China, Hong Kong and Vietnam, leaving at least 23 people dead and dozens injured.

Typhoon Yagi was still a storm when it blew through the northwestern Philippines into the South China Sea on Wednesday, but it has left at least 16 people dead, 17 missing and more than 2 million affected, mainly from landslides and widespread flooding.

Typhoon Yagi struck the city of Wenchang in China’s Hainan province on Friday afternoon, packing maximum sustained winds of about 152 mph near its center. Local authorities said Saturday that the typhoon killed three people and injured at least 92.

About 420,000 residents of Hainan province were evacuated before the typhoon made landfall, and another 500,000 people in Guangdong province were evacuated before Typhoon Yagi made a second landfall in the province’s Xuwen county on Friday night.

The typhoon made landfall in Vietnam on Saturday afternoon, killing at least four people so far.