A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm named Trami at 2am yesterday, and is projected to move west-northwest toward waters east of Luzon Island, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said.
As of 8am, Trami’s center was 700km east of Manila, or 1,180km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost tip, moving in a northwesterly direction.
It was carrying maximum sustained winds of 65kph, with gusts of up to 90kph, CWA data showed.
Photo courtesy of the Central Weather Administration
The weather agency forecast the center of the storm would be over waters 470km east-northeast of Manila or 820km southeast of Oluanpi at 8am today, and urged ships sailing in the Bashi Channel and east of the Philippines to closely watch Trami’s movements.
Independent meteorologist Daniel Wu (吳德榮) did not expect the storm to have a direct impact on Taiwan, and said Trami’s core structure was loose and unlikely to intensify into a typhoon.
Yet while the probability of a direct hit on Taiwan had fallen below 8 percent, the storm could bring significant rainfall to eastern Taiwan because of its size, he said yesterday.
Photo: screen grab from the Central Weather Administration Web site
Trami’s peripheral winds are set to bring rainfall in Taiwan’s northern and eastern areas, the CWA said.
The agency is highly unlikely to issue land or sea warnings for the storm, but Trami’s radius is expected to grow to 280km this afternoon, increasing the risk of torrential rain and related effects in northern Taiwan as well as Yilan and Hualien counties over the following two days, CWA forecaster Huang En-hung (黃恩鴻) said.
Additional reporting by Lin Chih-yi
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