yeah. poor mieng` trung. have always been affected by natural disasters.

Yea, this typhoon looks really scary. I heard it had winds topping 160 mph!

You mean 160 kph? At 160 mph that would bring destruction worster than Katrina.


HANOI, Vietnam Vietnam began evacuating more than 180,000 people from its central coast as powerful Typhoon Xangsane approached from the Philippines, where it left at least 63 people dead and about 70 missing, officials said Saturday.

"The evacuation, the biggest ever in central Vietnam, must be completed before 5 p.m Saturday," said Van Phu Chinh, head of the regional Flood and Storm Control Department in Danang.

The evacuees were from nine central provinces that could be affected by the typhoon, he said.

About 522 fishing boats with nearly 4,800 fishermen on board were still out at sea, he said.

In Danang, soldiers helped fishermen who had returned to shore move their boats to higher land Saturday. People streamed out of coastal communities, boarding buses and motorcycles to seek shelter inland in schools and government buildings.

Xangsane, packing winds of 120 kilometers (75 miles) per hour and gusts of up to 150 kph (93 mph), was expected to make landfall in central Vietnam early Sunday, according to the national weather center.

In the Philippines, at least 63 people were killed by flash floods, landslides and falling debris, officials said Saturday. About 70 others were missing, the Office of Civil Defense said, adding that close to 40,000 people were forced to flee their homes in metropolitan Manila and 15 northern and central provinces.

Electricity was restored to about 60 percent of the main Philippine island of Luzon, which suffered a total blackout at the height of the typhoon on Thursday, the state-run National Transmission Corp. said. Large areas in the southern Luzon region were still without electricity.

The civil defense office said damage to infrastructure and agricultural crops and livestock had topped 365 million pesos (US$7.2 million; €5.7 million) and was likely rise as more reports of destruction come in.

Metropolitan Manila and nearby provinces were declared under a state of calamity, which allows local officials to quickly draw emergency funds for relief and rehabilitation.

In Vietnam, heavy rains were expected in central provinces late Saturday, the national weather center said, warning the storm could unleash flash floods and landslides across the region.

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung was directing emergency operations in Danang, and urged provincial governments to report to the operations center every two hours, Saturday's Communist Party newspaper Nhan Dan (People) reported.

^ Hmm. I'm almost sure I heard that, i.e. 160 mph, and not 160 km.p.h. If I'm wrong then my bad. But still, they say it's pretty monstrous nonetheless...

cross my finger and pray for Central Region people.May the force and the courage be with them!!I'm impressed with the amount of works the gov has done for these provinces affected by the typhoon.May the they draw some lessons from the Chanchu chapter

I remembered back there, every years around this time, we students had to donate something for victims of typhoons. Central region, like the Philippines, always face danger of typhoons yearly.

I just don't understand why the government did not consider this problem when they decide to build oil refinery there. It may help develop this poor region, but look at the energy crisis in the US after huricane Karina hit oil refinery center in Texas.

If you design things big and strong enough (which cost money), it can stand that wind speed.
Normal design wind speed (gut 3 seconds) around my place is around 30-45m/s (=108-162 km/hr); building stands it fine.

However, kinematic nergy is 1/2m*v^2 (which means that a little increase in wind speed would cause energy to goes up at the rate of the power of 2). This storm, i heard, is category 13 on Beaufort scale

Category 8: 62-74 km/h
Category 9: 75-88 km/h
Category 10: 89-102 km/h
Category 11: 103-117 km/h
Category 12: 118-133 km/h
Category 13: 134-149 km/h
Category 14: 150-166 km/h
Category 15: 167-183 km/h
Category 16: 184-201 km/h
Category 17: 202-220 km/h.

Katrina is of category 17, much more devastating than Xangsane.

The danger of collapse of old offshore structures is not quite high if it is at deep sea, where wave move rather up and down without releasing the energy. Part of it is because of the level sea bed. Only when it reaches the shore, the seabed rise up causing a the energy to transform totally to wave energy with turbulence (refer to Bernoulli equation if want to know more).