[color=#0000FF]Mod’s note: In the event of a typhoon, work and school closures will be announced here:[/color] typhoon.dgpa.gov.tw/ndse.html
First one of the season, near Filipinas.
Rare ocurrance so early in the season, maybe every 10 years to have one in January/February. Shanshan is the name.
Next one coming to a place near you - expect related weekend wetness…
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Aye.
Tropical Depression 07W, to be Typhoon Soulik if it develops as expected.
Very very early tracking forecasts a NE coast hit around next weekend.
Eh, guys, where are the tracking links? The ones I have in my computer do not seem to work. Anyone with the Multi Agency one? I got the Japanese agency all right, CWB and the British thinghie. JWTC does not seem to open.
Is my typhoon holiday virginity gonna be popped soon?
This is a useful mirror of the JWTC tracks and “prognostic reasoning” (under “discussion”): wunderground.com/tropical/
Here’s a multi-tracker: typhoon2000.ph/multi/
Thank you. Furthermore, is there any app we can use for typhoon warnings on smartphones?
will this upcoming typhoon effect flights coming in negatively? please tell me it won’t 
Possibly. It is too early to tell, though, but does not look good for incoming or outgoing. Expect delays, so check with airport/airlines constantly.
For no good reason, I look at http://www.tropicalstormrisk.com/ first. It’s not as pretty as wunderground 
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Forecast track has now shifted north of Taiwan during today. Unlikely to affect TPE airport much, as things stand.
Yes, not an app, but the below is as good:
Surf to tropicalstormrisk.com and apply for the TSR Alerts. You will be notified if anything nasty is forming and heading to the location you are in.
System works flawlessly. Already had 2 elevated warnings for SOULIK , heading to …Taipei … 
This guy’s breakdown has been very informative over the last couple of years.
Hmmm… I’d hold off on suggestions of this kind… 
There’s a good number of websites that show the development of typhoons and forecasts in one way or another, but US sites usually get their raw data from US sources, such as the NOAA and the JTWC (or RSMC).
The JMA (Japan) uses its own model, in addition, and i have the impression that the PAGASA (Philippines) uses its own as well. Not sure what model the CWB (Taiwan) uses. When it comes to forecasting a typhoon’s track, i can’t tell which of the models has a better track record, but have found the JTWC forecasts to be reliable enough to consider their site my first stop. The reason for their reliability is probably that they make use of several models and have experienced humans weight the output data and derive a forecast that way (when one of the models diverges significantly from the concensus, you will see comment to that effect in the discussion section). One interesting site shows the past track of a given typhoon, together with its strength - this is useful for short term forecasts and also to explain some strange weather patterns, because the track of the typhoon is plotted in shorter time intervals and more accurately (as it was observed), rather than smoothed out as other sites do: imocwx.com/typ.htm (there you need to click on the 動画 link to get an animation of the recent or current typhoon).
Supplementary data that we find useful comes from the JMA, such as this chart:
jma.go.jp/jp/g3/
and from the regional coastguard detachment:
www6.kaiho.mlit.go.jp/11kanku/is … isyou.html (if you click on any of the orange arrows you’ll see 12-hour history charts of wind direction and speed)
The information from the coastguard is particularly useful in determining the path and the width of a typhoon’s eye, which we use at times to modify the fortifications that we apply to our house (it’s necessary to keep gates and doors closed and supported on the sides where the wind pushes in, but we keep those on the opposite side (lee side) open, so as to limit damage in case a barrier breaks down (a quick explanation: imagine you have a building with all doors and windows firmly closed and supported on the inside, but a door or window on the side facing the wind breaks down: the air will enter the building and increase the pressure inside abruptly, since it has nowwhere to go, and as a result one or more of the doors or windows pop out - we’ve seen that happen. Even the roof can be lifted up and taken off that way. If lee side doors and windows are open, however, a breakdown of a wind facing door will cause less structral damage at that moment. Long-term damage from not being able to re-establish a barrier at all where a door or window had been broken down is another problem, but we have fortunately not yet had to encounter that situation).
So when you have openings on the lee-side, how much wind and rain (if any) are coming in through those areas? I appreciate the point you’re making, but I can’t imagine being able to persuade my SO that it would be a good idea to leave a side of the property unbarricaded.
It’s must have been at least 3 summers now since a large typhoon hit Hualien, and I’m close to forgetting the full experience. We certainly haven’t had to deal with anything really big since we moved into this new property. That’s evidenced by the amount of growth in the local river bed, there are swathes of 20 foot trees now on the sides of the channel.
What makes this typhoon so popular so early?
Usually when I saw news about typhoons 2 days before they were scheduled to arrive in Taiwan, people were totally “no problem”. With this one, some people are already saying they’re not sure about out weekend plans because the typhoon.
Is it supposed to be extra strong? Or is the potential track super scary?
Don’t get me wrong, I usually get “excited” about typhoons early, but I feel like this one gets extra attention.
I’m just hoping it hits on friday so I don’t need to go to work
First one of the year gets a bit more attention. But long-term discussions about them on here are pretty much the norm it seems to me! This one doesn’t seem especially strong–then again it’s usually more about the rain when it comes to damage and you never know with that–and may not even hit us. But it always pays to be aware.