A CENTRAL WMO WEBSITE PROVIDES LINKS TO UP-TO-DATE ADVISORIES ON ALL TROPICAL CYCLONES

About 80 tropical cyclones form annually over warm tropical oceans. When they develop and attain an intensity with surface wind speed exceeding 118 km/h, they are called hurricanes in the Atlantic, typhoons in the western North Pacific region and severe tropical cyclones, tropical cyclones or similar names in the Indian Ocean and South-West Pacific regions.

No matter whether they are called tropical cyclones, hurricanes or typhoons, they are among the most devastating of all natural hazards.

Their potential for wrecking havoc caused by the violent winds, torrential rainfall and associated storm surges, floods, tornadoes and landslide or mud slides is exacerbated by the extent of the areas they affect, their severity, the frequency of occurrence and the vulnerability of the impacted areas.

Every year several tropical cyclones cause sudden-onset disasters of varying harshness, causing loss of life, human suffering, destruction of property, severe disruption of normal activities and set-back to social and economic advances.

However, a particularly important aspect of tropical cyclones, as distinct from most other natural hazards, is the availability now of operational systems for monitoring, forecasting and warning of tropical cyclones, in the concerned parts of the world, as a basis for preparedness action and, hence, disaster mitigation.

A network of five centres designated by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) as Tropical Cyclone Regional Specialized Meteorological Centres (RSMCs) and located in La Réunion, Miami, Nadi (Fiji), New Delhi and Tokyo, and six specialized tropical cyclone warning centres with regional responsibility located in Brisbane, Darwin, Perth, Wellington, Port Moresby and Honolulu, carry out these activities. As a result of international cooperation and coordination, and with the aid of modern technology, such as satellites, weather radars and computers, tropical cyclones around the globe are now being monitored from their early stages of formation.

The activities are coordinated at the global and regional levels by WMO through its World Weather Watch and Tropical Cyclone Programmes.

For convenience a specific website on the WMO homepage (Go to: http://www.wmo.ch/web/www/TCP/rsmcs.html http://www.wmo.ch/web/www/TCP/rsmcs.html) is linked to the tropical cyclone RSMCs.

Source: WMO