Awesome storms and our obsession with landfalls

Author’s note: This article was first published on my GMANews.TV blog in October 2009. I felt that it remained relevant and so decided to revise and re-submit it to Nordis Weekly. Now that residents of Luzon have just gone through destructive typhoon Pedring, it seems appropriate to report it again, this time in my own Iraia blog.
An airplane's view of the wall of clouds that line the eye of a cyclone. Within the wall, the weather is calm and clear. Notice the blue sky seen from inside the eye. Photo from NOAA.

It is typhoon season once more, and those of us in media who have to file reports on a daily or hourly basis know how it is to be on typhoon-tracking mode—to be familiar with PAGASA terminology, to have some sense of geography, and to be on our toes for those instant weather bulletins.

This triggers in me a memorable if somewhat tragic time in October 2009, when my colleagues and I at GMA News Online were trying to keep up with reportage on two successive typhoons, Pepeng and Ramil. Continue reading “Awesome storms and our obsession with landfalls”