Tokyo may get hit by a typhoon (hurricane) during the Olympics

TOKYO, Japan — The 2020 Olympics in Tokyo will be juggling a lot of concerns over the next couple of weeks.

There’s COVID-19, record hot weather and possibly a hurricane or two — or as they call them in the Northwest Pacific, typhoons.

While the Atlantic Basin is quiet with tropical activity, the Pacific Ocean is quite busy. 

The Joint Typhoon Warning Center is the National Hurricane Center of the western Pacific. There are currently two active tropical systems, but those aren’t heading toward Japan where the Olympics are being held.

However, reliable forecast models such as the European and the American GFS model develop a potential typhoon and bring it near the Olympics in Tokyo Sunday or Monday. Another typhoon could develop and threaten the same area the following week.

Our 10 Tampa Bay team of meteorologists will be tracking the potential development of these systems throughout the Olympics. Since the development is still days away, predicting the specific track, intensity and possible impacts to the Olympics is still too difficult.

Unlike the Atlantic hurricane season, the Pacific typhoon season has no seasonal boundaries, though most tropical cyclones typically develop between May and October.

The western Pacific is actually the most active basin in the world for typhoons and has spawned some of the world’s most intense tropical systems on record. Typhoon Haiyan, which killed thousands in 2013, packed 195-mph sustained winds.

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