A cyclone in the Philippine Sea reached wind speeds of about 185 miles per hour (around 290 kilometers per hour) on Tuesday afternoon EST. Those wind speeds are the strongest of any storm this year, forecasters say.
As of Wednesday morning EST, Super Typhoon Champi had winds of 175 miles per hour; it is expected to weaken in the next day or so, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The storm is currently about 430 nautical miles south of Kadena Air Base in Japan and is heading northwest, according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center.
You’re more likely to see strong storms in the western Pacific than anywhere else on the planet. But the typhoon underscores how tumultuous Pacific storm activity has been in comparison with activity in the Atlantic. In the North Atlantic, 2026’s strongest storm so far was Hurricane Isaias, which had maximum winds of about 120 mph (193 kph), according to Colorado State University’s (CSU’s) cyclone database. By contrast, in the northeastern Pacific, September’s Hurricane Polo hit wind speeds of about 178 mph (286 kph), while in the northwestern Pacific, April’s Typhoon Sinlaku and July’s Typhoon Bavi also reached around the same strength. Champi is the 25th northwestern Pacific storm this year, according to CSU’s tracker.
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To be considered a typhoon or a hurricane, a cyclone must achieve wind speeds of at least 74 mph (119 kph). The designation of hurricane or typhoon depends on where the cyclone occurs. In the Northern Hemisphere, Pacific cyclones that occur west of the international date line are considered typhoons, while those occurring east of that border are categorized as hurricanes.
It’s been a historic year for cyclones. As Scientific American previously reported, the Atlantic has been unusually quiet: Hurricane Isaias was the first storm of its kind for the season, setting a record for the latest-forming first Atlantic hurricane since reliable record-keeping began. Meanwhile the Hawaiian Islands in the Pacific Ocean have seen an unusually high number of hurricanes this season.
Those trends are driven in part by El Niño, a climate pattern that influences weather across the globe. During El Niño years, hurricanes activity tends to slow in the Atlantic and pick up in parts of the Pacific.
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