Typhoon Forecast, Francisco / Mekkhala strengthens in the Philippine Sea

[00:00:00]It is now the eighth named storm system of 2026 in the Western Pacific and only the third time we've had a named storm every single month from January to June in the West Pac as well. Of course, this is Maymayla expected to move into the PAR today where it will be called Francisco by PAGASA here and absolutely going to be moving in and intensifying.

[00:00:23]It's about to become a strong typhoon winds of 130 to 140 km/h. Could even be higher than that according to some agencies like JTWC before this turns just towards the northeast of Luzon and recurves towards the north. I'm pretty confident on that recurvature and I'm going to break that down here in just a moment. But there's look at your satellite imagery right now. Still continuing to organize. It is deepening.

[00:00:47]Uh, we did have that big flare up of convection yesterday and today we still have this moisture feeding into it from the south. You can see it right in here.

[00:00:56]Now, this is important cuz this is also going to set up that enhanced toboggan but also is allowing our storm system to [clears throat] strengthen just a bit here. And as it moves into the PAR, it's moving over a very warm pocket of water.

[00:01:07]This is going to allow for that additional intensification and I wouldn't be surprised here, especially as we go out through Sunday and into Monday, we see a bit of rapid intensification meaning that pressure drops and this gets up to that stronger typhoon uh level. Taking a look at the broader picture, this is rounding the West Pac High that's located right in here. But we do have these troughs coming in across uh southeastern areas of China, which is the big thing. This rounds the high, gets hooked by those troughs, and gets pulled towards the north. Now, the exact timing of that, that's the big question up for debate at this time. Some of those high-resolution guidances turns it a little bit further towards the east. Other ones kind of creep it very close to northeastern Luzon bringing places like Aparri into kind of the fold for potential tropical storm uh conditions. One thing that is confident when much of the guidance though is despite when this makes that turn, we're going to be seeing this, that southwest monsoonal enhancement pouring in behind it. Meaning places like uh parts of Mindoro off towards like Boracay, if you're going on vacation out there, I don't know, Palawan. Uh and then eventually back to late week, all that moisture shifts towards further north into uh Manila. We're going to see kind of a an enhanced Habagat or the southwest monsoon pick up here increasing rainfall. I don't think it'll be as heavy as we've seen with Sinlaku, but still going to be looking at that chance of some um flooding out here as the storm system kicks off there uh towards the north. So, that's a general overview of what we got going on right now. I do want to get into the details of this and kind of break down why we have that turn towards the north. So, first off, talking about the satellite imagery here. And yeah, here's our low-level center. We have some decent outflow and you can see a little bit of shear right there, and we still have dry air on the western side of it. I think that is kind of the hindrance at this point of why we're not seeing that rapid intensification just yet. But, the further west this goes, I think this is going to displace that dry air, and we're going to tap in more to that moisture towards the south. It's going to help fuel up our storm system. And it's not only just, you know, the agencies showing this, most of the guidance also indicates um this intensification here up to some models indicating a cat five or a super typhoon. This is a Google DeepMind and really kind of picking up on that rapid intensification today, a tropical storm, but look at that, pulls it up to a three near a four there due east of uh Luzon there. But, the good news for the Philippines is that all the ensembles with the Google DeepMind, which is pretty good at tracking, picks up on that trough and turns it towards the north. Bad news for the southern Japanese Islands, including Okinawa. Now, one thing I do want to stress is as it turns towards the north, it is going to encounter an abundance of dry air and shear, which should allow it to weaken significantly.

[00:04:03]So, it doesn't look like Okinawa is going to be getting like a super typhoon out here. Wonder what's going on in the background of that model. All right, let's go over to this one here. This is a high resolution guidance and it kind of shows, you know, our storm system gets really close to northern areas of Luzon, but then it makes that turn towards the north and you can see here on the northern periphery of it all this dry air, a lot of shear kind of buffeting it and I think it a lot of the convection should get displaced towards the south and towards the east of this storm system as it starts to turn towards the north. So, depending on the exact track, Okinawa might not see a lot if it tracks right over the island. Albeit, if it tracks just towards the west, that could be a totally different story. That is still like 5 to 7 days out. There's a lot of time to continue to watch this and a lot of uncertainty in that extended outlook.

[00:04:52]We don't know right now is a high chance of these damaging winds in that area in the red. Lower chance, but potentially still possibility for parts of the Philippines and Taiwan also in the fold here. If this doesn't make that turn very hard, it could run right into Taiwan or Ishigaki or yeah, potentially even over there towards Okinawa. It really depends on the timing and there's a multitude of factors about that turn towards the north.

[00:05:18]The stronger it is, the higher the chance it's going to make that turn quicker. The weaker it is, the more likely it would turn further towards the west. It also depends on the timing of the trough towards the north as well.

[00:05:30]So, if I was in Ishigaki, Miyakojima and yeah, Okinawa for that matter, I'd be watching this very closely. But the same thing goes for like a par in northeastern areas of Luzon. And then on the flip side of it, of course, that inflow on the backside of this storm system. So, even like Manila not escaping this. You're not going to get a direct impact from a typhoon by any means. I'm not saying that, but you could be seeing that inflow definitely kick in on the backside of this. So, make sure, you know, you're just prepped up, ready for a little bit of flood. I mean, it's our eighth named storm system of the year.

[00:06:03]Um no one ever said an El Nino year in the western Pacific would be below average. Just that the storms would form further towards the east and be more likely to recurve. And this is an exact scenario of that happening yet again.

[00:06:16]We've seen it with multiple storm systems already this year. So, this also creates that enhanced Habagat, which can create a little bit of flooding. So, do remember, um just don't underestimate flooding in your area, especially if you're in some mountainous terrains, watch out for landslides, things like that. Especially across the Cordillera Mountains out there in Baguio. I think some of those higher roadways could be looking at some issues eventually, probably next weekend uh there. Also, waves. Um the decently sized waves out here.

[00:06:43]Uh big rip currents, things like that.

[00:06:46]Just keep that in mind if you're heading out to any of the waters. We don't want a repeat of any other disasters that have happened recently out here. Um this is a similar situation to there. There was a big storm towards the east to get rip currents that are far like long period swells far away from the storm.

[00:07:03]So, the weather for example, across the east coast here of the Philippines, not going to look all too bad, but you will have those big waves preceding this storm system over the course of the next few days, which um creates those large swells and rip currents even if the storm is still offshore. So, something else to just keep in mind as we monitor this storm system. All right, so looking ahead for our forecast on Sunday. Yeah, you see a lot of showers for Mindanao, Visayas, little bit less for Sunday further towards the north, but eventually but probably late next week, this whole flow is going to shift off into that direction. Since you're not getting a lot of rain further north, places like in the Cagayan Valley, 43° there, while Shark Out is at 35, little bit cooler. You got just some scattered tropical showers out there. Baguio, probably not till mid to late week. So, you see there on Wednesday, got the rain chances ticking up just a bit. And also, temperatures coming down because of that consistent cloud cover in monsoon flow.

[00:07:56]While further towards the south into Cebu, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, more of a consistent monsoon flow impacting you out there. Now, I know for our friends across Taiwan, Okinawa, you're probably want to know exactly when this is going to impact you, if it's going to impact you, and really the details I'm giving you here, that that's about the extent of it. This is going to turn towards the north. The exact impacts, not certain, but I would still give it about a week out. We still got some time to continue to monitor this. While the Philippines, northeastern Luzon, if I was in Aparri, I would prepare for the potential of at least in tropical storm strength conditions, maybe some storm surge along those low-lying coastal areas at the mouth of the Cagayan River.

[00:08:37]That could be an issue, as well. I know I'm kind of getting into the weeds, bouncing all over the place, but I I don't want to cover all of my bases when we're talking about this tropical system, especially since it's still developing. We still have time to prepare and monitor this storm system.

[00:08:51]And I think prepare, not panic. Hopefully, we don't have big impacts, but just giving you a kind of a wide range of where we are seeing the influence of this. So, yeah, I'm meteorologist Robert Speta. If you have any questions or anything like that, please let me know in the comment section down below. I really appreciate you guys' feedback. As I just showed you there, our Patreon members, thank you so much for everybody that supports this channel. If you want to become a Patreon member, check out that link as well down below.

[00:09:19]Yeah. All right, thanks for watching.

[00:09:20]Stay safe. I'll have another update probably later tonight. All right.