Typhoon Yutu ravages U.S. islands of Saipan, Tinian with 180 mph winds

One of the Earth’s strongest storms this year struck U.S. territories in the western Pacific Ocean.

A strengthening Super Typhoon Yutu, with sustained winds of at least 180 mph, trekked through the Northern Mariana Islands.

The storm roared across the islands of Saipan and Tinian, both U.S. territories, as it was set to become among the most intense storms — if not the most — on record to impact U.S. soil.

The Joint Typhoon Warning Center now considers Yutu an incredibly strong Category 5 equivalent typhoon. Because reconnaissance planes do not fly in the western Pacific to directly measure conditions inside storms, the intensity of 180 mph, or 155 knots, is based on estimates from satellites.

Meteorologist Ryan Maue of WeatherModels.com tweeted that the storm would be a “Category 6 if Atlantic scale was extrapolated.”

Yutu is tied with Mangkhut for the strongest storm of the 2018 season to date. If it strengthens further, Yutu will rank among the all-time most intense storms ever recorded.

“This is an historically significant event,” tweeted Michael Lowry, a hurricane specialist with the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

While the western Pacific is where the world’s most powerful tropical cyclones tend to form, Yutu’s strength was likely to be unprecedented in modern history for the Northern Mariana Islands. The islands are home to slightly more than 50,000 people, a majority of whom live in the largest, northernmost island of Saipan.

Yutu passed through the island chain. In Saipan, wind gusts to hurricane force were recorded, and much worse were expected to move through as the eye of the storm passed. Gusts were forecast to possibly top 200 mph.

A terrifying, grating wind could be heard in audio of a live EarthCam broadcasting from the island. As the storm approached Saipan, the pressure was plummeting at an astonishing rate.

The islands of Tinian and Saipan took the eyewall of the right-front quadrant of Yutu, which is typically where a storm’s most severe conditions are found. Extreme destruction and suffering in both the short and long term were anticipated in these areas.