1975 Pacific typhoon season

A thin year with a displaced monsoon trough

The Joint Typhoon Warning Center called 1975 a sharp drop from the year before. It counted 20 named tropical cyclones, about 30 percent below the long-term average of 28.6, and 14 typhoons. JTWC issued 435 warnings on 110 calendar days, against an average of 145 warning days from 1959 to 1974. The site's archive agrees on 20 tropical storms and 14 typhoons and puts accumulated cyclone energy at 161.

JTWC tied the quiet stretches to the monsoon trough. Through most of July and again through September the trough sat near 5N, south of its usual summer position between 10N and 15N, and after a brief return in October it slid south again for November. Only 14 named storms formed in the trough. Others grew from cyclones in the tropical upper tropospheric trough, including Tropical Storm Mamie in July, Tropical Storm Susan in August and Typhoons Tess and Winnie in September, about 16 percent of the year's cyclones and close to the long-term share.

Counts differ with the definitions behind them. JTWC tallied storms from its own one-minute warnings and named three of them super typhoons with winds above 130 kt: Nina, Elsie and June. The site counts 5 major typhoons because it uses a 96 kt threshold, which also takes in Phyllis at 120 kt and Cora at 105 kt. Some season lists give 21 named storms, while those drawn from the JTWC report give 20.

Typhoon Lola and a 180-day gap

Lola formed in a monsoon trough that had drifted unusually far north for January, about 400 nm south of Guam. JTWC noted it was only the ninth January typhoon since 1945. The storm crossed the Palau Islands, where crops on Kayangel were nearly wiped out, and reached minimal typhoon strength late on 23 January. It struck the sugar-growing central Philippines near peak intensity the next afternoon, with a reconnaissance pressure of 976 mb. JTWC reported at least 30 people killed by landslides and flying debris and more than 300 houses destroyed by storm surge in the coastal town of Tandog.

Lola then weakened to a tropical storm, crossed into the South China Sea and faded after a cold surge from Asia reached it on 27 January. The basin went 180 days without another named storm, until Mamie in late July. JTWC said only 1973, at 183 days, had a longer stretch since 1945. A depression crossed the Philippines in April, but the site's archive gives it only 25 kt.

Typhoon Nina, Taiwan and the Banqiao Dam

Nina grew from a disturbance near 20N 137E on 29 July and deepened explosively late on 1 August. Reconnaissance measured a 63 mb pressure fall in about 18 hours as winds rose from 65 kt to 130 kt. The archive places the peak at 135 kt on 2 August, about 200 nm east of Taiwan, with a lowest pressure of 900 hPa. Nina weakened before landfall and came ashore near Hualien at 0300 UTC on 3 August with winds JTWC estimated at 100 kt.

Taiwan's central mountains broke up the core and spared the most populous areas the worst winds. JTWC still reported 25 dead, 4 missing and 168 injured on the island, more than 3,000 homes at least partly collapsed, 39 fishing boats sunk and a 16,000-ton Korean freighter capsized near Kaohsiung. Nina crossed the Taiwan Strait, reached the Chinese mainland at about 60 kt late on 3 August and lost its tropical character inland the next day.

The storm's worst toll came after JTWC stopped tracking it. Nina's moisture met a cold front over central China and produced extreme rainfall that contributed to the failure of the Banqiao Dam. The article's lead cites about 126,000 deaths from the flood and its storm section says at least 229,000, a range that reflects differing accounts of the disaster.

Phyllis and Rita flood Japan in August

August brought five numbered cyclones. Typhoon Ora grew from a depression to a typhoon in 30 hours with help from an upper-level trough, crossed Miyako Jima and struck the central China coast near Yung-chia on 12 August at 65 kt. JTWC tied little damage to Ora itself, but monsoon rains it drew over the Philippines caused flooding, and rough water near Tacloban capsized a crowded motorboat, leaving 15 dead and 30 missing.

Typhoon Phyllis peaked at 120 kt on 14 August after aircraft found 920 mb west of Iwo Jima. It weakened on its approach and made landfall on the southwestern edge of Shikoku on the morning of 17 August with 80 kt sustained winds. JTWC reported at least 60 dead, 146 injured and 12 missing on Shikoku alone from rain, floods and landslides, with 489 houses collapsed and 58 washed away.

Typhoon Rita followed within days. It formed southeast of Okinawa on 18 August, stalled and reversed near the island, then turned north and reached typhoon strength on the 21st with gales reaching 300 nm on its eastern side. Its eye crossed Murotomisaki, where the station read 966.3 mb and 80 kt winds, before landfall about 30 nm west of Osaka late on 22 August. Rita raced across Honshu and became extratropical, and about 8.2 inches of rain fell on Hokkaido in 24 hours. JTWC reported at least 26 deaths and 36,000 flooded houses across Japan and cited newspaper accounts of Hokkaido's worst flooding in ten years.

Luzon, Taiwan and Hong Kong in the autumn

Typhoon Alice formed east of the Philippines in mid-September and made landfall near Casiguran, Luzon, at 2000 UTC on 17 September with 75 kt winds, its peak. JTWC reported no significant damage from the crossing. Alice went on to strike Hainan at about 60 kt and died over northern Vietnam. Typhoon Betty passed within 50 nm of Guam as a disturbance, peaked at 95 kt with a 944 mb reconnaissance pressure on 22 September, and crossed southern Taiwan near Taitung with winds near 80 kt. Unofficial reports cited by JTWC gave 12 dead, more than 200 homes leveled and nearly a thousand tourists stranded by mudslides.

Typhoon Cora reached 105 kt east of Okinawa on 4 October and then recurved, passing 120 nm south-southeast of Tokyo as it raced northeast. Typhoon Elsie deepened even faster than Nina: reconnaissance recorded a 69 mb pressure drop in under a day on 10 and 11 October as winds climbed from 65 kt to 135 kt. It moved through the Batan Islands on the 12th and passed 35 nm south of Hong Kong on the 14th. The Royal Observatory called Elsie one of the most intense October typhoons to affect the colony, recording 70 kt sustained winds and gusts to 118 kt. Low tide limited flooding, and JTWC reported no deaths and 46 people injured by flying debris.

Typhoon Flossie peaked at only 70 kt, yet it caused the year's worst disaster at sea. Its gales and high seas sank two timber freighters, the Ming Sing and the Kinabalu Satu, near the southern approaches to Hong Kong on 21 and 22 October, and JTWC reported 44 men lost. Flossie had fallen to 50 kt by landfall on the Luichow Peninsula on 23 October.

Typhoon June's record pressure

June formed in the central Carolines on 16 November and sat nearly still near 6N 143E. On the 18th it turned north toward a weakness in the ridge and deepened by 52 mb in 11 hours and 90 mb in 24 hours. At 0843 UTC on 19 November a reconnaissance dropsonde near the cloud wall measured 876 mb, which JTWC called the lowest sea-level pressure on record, 1 mb below Typhoons Ida in 1958 and Nora in 1973. The site's archive lists 875 hPa and a peak one-minute wind of 160 kt at 12 UTC that day, the season's only Category 5 reading. The record stood until Typhoon Tip in 1979.

June never made landfall. It passed about 200 nm west of Guam on the evening of the 19th, with winds of 50 kt or more reaching 200 nm from its center. More than 3,200 residents went to evacuation centers, and Andersen Air Force Base recorded a 70 kt peak gust. JTWC estimated Guam's losses at $300,000, most of it crop damage, and reported flooding and crop losses on Eauripik and Woleai atolls in Yap district without casualties. June then recurved and became extratropical north of 30N on 23 November while still holding typhoon-force winds.

The year closed with two December depressions, numbered 24 and 25, that never reached storm strength in the archive. JTWC reported that their torrential rains caused floods in the Philippines that killed 97 people.