1995 Pacific typhoon season

A weak monsoon after El Niño faded

The Joint Typhoon Warning Center described 1995 as the year that ended a prolonged El Niño, with a weak monsoon, many weak and poorly organized cyclones, and a westward shift in where storms formed. For most of the middle and late year, low-level easterlies converged at low latitudes while westerly winds aloft carried cirrus away to the east. Outside two brief monsoon episodes, in mid-September and mid-October, storm formation stayed confined to the South China Sea and the Philippine Sea. The JTWC counted eight significant cyclones in the South China Sea alone.

The site's archive gives an accumulated cyclone energy of 251.8 for the calendar year, using US-agency one-minute winds during the tropical stage. The JTWC counted 26 cyclones of at least tropical storm strength in its warnings, two below its long-term average, and 15 typhoons against an average of 18. Its total includes Tropical Storm 06W, upgraded after the season from satellite scatterometer data, and Tropical Storm Colleen, a subtropical Kona low that crossed the date line in November; the site counts 24 tropical storms. Other season lists give 24 named storms and 8 typhoons, figures that follow the Japan Meteorological Agency's ten-minute winds, which run lower than one-minute estimates for the same storm. The developing 1995 to 1996 La Niña also helped keep the year quiet.

Seven months before the first typhoon

A tropical depression formed near the equator in January, but the archive's first tropical-stage observation of a storm comes on 27 April, from Tropical Storm Chuck in the Marshall Islands. Chuck held storm strength for about two days, and its remnants later brought Guam about a quarter of its May rainfall. Tropical Storm Deanna and Tropical Storm Eli grew from a weak monsoon trough across Micronesia and reached storm strength in early June. Deanna crossed the central Philippines on 2 June, stalled in the South China Sea and then raced northeast through the Ryukyu Islands; Taiwan suffered agricultural losses. Eli passed close to Guam on 4 June and dissipated at sea.

Typhoon Faye became the first typhoon on 19 July, which the JTWC noted tied the record for the latest first typhoon in the basin. Faye peaked at 105 kt in the archive and moved north through the East China Sea to strike the southern coast of South Korea on 23 July, one of the most intense storms to reach the peninsula in years. The JTWC cited press reports of at least 14 people killed and 21 missing in Korea, including nine who died when high surf swept a bus off a coastal road, plus two crewmen dead when the cargo ship Far East Beauty sank. The tanker Sea Prince ran aground and leaked oil off Yosu. Later totals give 16 deaths in Japan.

Late summer storms on the South China coast

Late July and August sent a string of small and moderate storms into southern China. Typhoon Gary absorbed Tropical Storm 06W inside a large monsoon depression near Luzon and came ashore close to Shantou on 31 July; the JTWC upgraded it to a typhoon after the season from ship reports and delayed observations in the city. Typhoon Helen reached 70 kt just before landfall east of Hong Kong on 12 August. The JTWC cited 23 deaths reported by Chinese media and one death with two missing in Hong Kong, where Helen caused about 100 landslides and roughly 600 mm of rain over four days.

Tropical Storm Janis merged with a smaller depression in the Philippine Sea and, in an unusual outcome, lost its deep convection before regenerating east of Shanghai. It crossed the Yellow Sea and struck central Korea near Seoul on 26 August. The JTWC cited reports of 45 dead and nine missing in Korea, 30 of them crushed by landslides, more than 22,000 people left homeless and about US$428.5 million in damage, which it called the country's largest rain-related disaster. Typhoon Lois, one of the eight South China Sea storms, reached typhoon strength over southern Hainan and struck northern Vietnam, where it flooded 45,000 acres of rice and destroyed 100 houses in Thanh Hoa province.

Kent and Ryan: record gusts in the Luzon Strait

Typhoon Kent formed in the Philippine Sea in late August and deepened fast as it neared the Luzon Strait. It peaked at 130 kt on 29 August in the archive. Basco, on Batan Island, sat briefly inside the northern edge of Kent's eye and recorded a gust of 140 kt and a pressure of 928 mb, while radar in Kaohsiung showed concentric eyewalls for at least 22 hours. Kent went on to strike China just east of Hong Kong. The JTWC reported five deaths on Luzon, where 65,000 people fled mudflows off Mount Pinatubo, 30 deaths in Guangdong and 17 in Hainan, and an estimated US$87 million in damage in China. Later totals give 52 casualties and US$89 million in damage in 1995 dollars.

Typhoon Ryan formed in the South China Sea in mid-September and followed an S-shaped track north. The JTWC called it the first storm on its records to both form and reach super typhoon strength inside the South China Sea; the archive peak is 130 kt on 21 September. Passing near Lanyu, off Taiwan, on 22 September, Ryan produced a gust of 166 kt that tied the strongest ever measured in a typhoon, matching Typhoon Cora at Miyako-jima in 1966. Ryan then crossed the southern Ryukyus and struck southwestern Japan.

The JTWC listed at least three fishermen dead in the northern Philippines and two deaths in Taiwan, where 4,500 households lost power. In southwestern Japan, rain flooded more than 950 homes and wind cut power to about 17,400. It killed five people along its track.

September's reverse monsoon trough

In mid-September a reverse-oriented monsoon trough stretched from the South China Sea across Luzon to northeast of Guam, and three storms formed along it at once: Oscar, Polly and Ryan. Storms in that pattern tend to move north, and both Polly and Ryan traced S-shaped tracks. Typhoon Mark had already shown the year's oddities at the start of the month, a midget storm that formed at high latitude and peaked at 95 kt near 35°N to 37°N while moving over cooler water.

Typhoon Oscar grew into a very large storm and peaked at 140 kt on 15 September, Category 5 in the archive. It threatened Tokyo but recurved enough to pass about 100 nm southeast of the city, moving at more than 40 kt. Rail, air and ferry services stopped across the Kanto Plain. The JTWC cited press reports of three deaths on land in Japan, six missing at sea and about 50 people hurt by falling debris;

Typhoon Sibyl formed as the pattern broke down and strengthened while crossing the Visayas, reaching 95 kt, before passing over Metro Manila into the South China Sea. The JTWC reported at least 108 deaths and 100 missing in the Philippines. Fifty of those deaths came in Cabalantian, north of Manila, where floods and lahars up to 18 feet high came off Mount Pinatubo. Damage exceeded 1 billion pesos, or US$38.5 million.

Ward, Zack and Angela close out the year

A large monsoon gyre formed in the Philippine Sea in mid-October and absorbed Tropical Storm Val. Typhoon Ted became a typhoon south of Hainan, where an oil rig 100 m above the sea recorded a 111 kt gust; it killed 61 people in China. Typhoon Ward passed about 70 nm north of Guam on the night of 17 October, cutting power to half of Tinian, then peaked at 140 kt on 19 October as it recurved away from land.

The monsoon trough across the Philippine Sea then spawned Yvette, Zack and Angela in quick succession. Typhoon Zack, like Sibyl, strengthened while crossing the Visayas and went on to peak at 120 kt over the South China Sea before striking Vietnam, weaker, on 1 November. The JTWC cited over 110 deaths in the Philippines, 72 of them in Negros Occidental, and more than 30,000 homes destroyed or damaged. The Hong Kong Observatory put the Philippine toll above 160, and 27 people died in Vietnam.

Typhoon Angela developed slowly and trailed Zack almost 4,000 nm across the basin. It reached 155 kt on 1 November with a minimum pressure of 910 hPa in the archive, the season's strongest storm, and still held Category 5 strength when it struck southern Luzon on 2 November, below its peak. Angela crossed Metro Manila, and the JTWC called it the most intense typhoon to hit the Philippines since Typhoon Joan in 1970.

The JTWC reported more than 600 dead and another 100 missing in the Philippines, over 96,000 homes destroyed, and a third of the country without power. At least 121 people died in Calauag, in Bicol, from storm surge and a river flood after a dam burst, and more than 100 in nearby Paracale, mainly in mudslides. Road and bridge damage reached about US$70 million and farm losses exceeded US$18 million. Later totals give 882 fatalities and 9.33 billion pesos of damage in 1995 pesos.

La Niña easterlies then shut down the deep tropics. Tropical Storm Brian formed under an upper-level cell in late October and recurved harmlessly. In early December a depression the JTWC first tracked as two systems, 32W and 33W, killed at least 14 people in floods and landslides in Bicol. Tropical Storm Dan, forming near the Philippines in late December, was the last storm of the year, with the archive's final tropical-stage observation on 31 December.