News Desk: Super Typhoon Chanthu made landfall in the far northern Philippines on Saturday, bringing destructive winds and heavy rain to the archipelago.
Chanthu, known as Kiko in the Philippines, was one of the strongest storms this year, with sustained winds of 260 kph (160 mph) before landfall — equivalent in strength to a Category 5 Atlantic hurricane at its peak.
The storm is expected to move toward Taiwan later on Saturday, with authorities now expanding land and sea warnings to the entire main island, after originally only issuing them to southern Pingtung and Taitung County.
Chanthu made landfall over the Batanes islands about 8:30 a.m. local time, according to the Philippine weather bureau PAGASA. It issued a Signal 4 warning for the Batanes area, which denotes “very destructive typhoon-force winds.”
The northeastern part of the Babuyan Islands, also in the far north of the archipelago, was under a Signal 3 warning at landfall, in which “destructive typhoon-force winds” were expected, before being downgraded to a Signal 2.
Impacted areas can also expect torrential rainfall and a moderate to high risk of a “life-threatening storm surge” of 2 to 3 meters throughout Saturday. There is also a risk of flash flooding and landslides due to the heavy rain.
To the south, the capital metro Manila was warned of enhanced monsoon rains.
