Super Typhoon Haiyan Storm Surge Survey Finds High Water Marks 46 Feet High

Category 5 Super Typhoon Haiyan, with satellite-estimated winds of 190 - 195 mph at landfall on November 8, 2013, pushed a massive storm surge of up to 23 feet (7 meters) into Tacloban, Philippines, newly-published storm surge survey results reveal.  A team of researchers led by Yoshimitsu Tajima of the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Tokyo found that at Haiyan's initial landfall point on the east coast of Samar Island, massive waves on top of the storm surge crashed against the coast, creating high water marks an astonishing 46 feet (14.1 meters) above mean sea level--some of the highest high-water marks ever recorded from a tropical cyclone.  The world record is 13 - 14.6 meters (43 - 48 feet) from Australia's March 5, 1899 Bathurst Bay Cyclone.  The greatest storm surge and high water mark recorded in an Atlantic hurricane are from Hurricane Katrina of 2005, which had a peak storm surge in Pass Christian, Mississippi of 27.8 feet (8.46 meters).  The sea bottom was very flat in this region, so the waves on top of the surge were relatively small, and the highest high water mark from Katrina was just a few inches higher, at 28 feet (8.53 meters.)  When deep water lies just offshore, as is the case for the east coast of the Philippines' Samar Island, huge waves will develop when the eyewall of an intense tropical cyclone moves over.  These huge waves broke very close to shore during Haiyan, and were able to run-up the steep hillsides to incredible heights.

Super Typhoon Haiyan Storm Surge Survey Finds High Water Marks 46 Feet High