Tropical Storm Danas formed on 16 July, 2019 over the western Philippine Sea, moving north of Luzon Island, Philippines, with maximum sustained winds of 65 km/h. Storm Danas is known in the Philippines as ‘Falcon’.
Moderate to heavy rainfall is forecast to affect parts of the Philippines over the next days. Danas is forecast to strengthen and move north towards Taiwan, where some evacuations have already begun.
Credit: NASA Worldview, Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS)
NASA’s Aqua satellite passed over the Northwester Pacific Ocean after Danas, the sixth tropical depression, formed.
On 16 July, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer or MODIS instrument aboard NASA’s Aqua satellite provided a visible image of Danas that showed a large depression the stretched the entire length of the Philippines. Strongest thunderstorms remained off the coast in the image, but the northwestern and western quadrants were already over the Luzon and Visayas regions.
At 5 a.m. EDT (0900 UTC), the center of Danas was located near latitude 17.2 degrees north and longitude 124.9 degrees west. Danas was about 587 nautical miles southwest of Kadena Air Base, Okinawa, Japan. Danas was moving to the west-northwest and had maximum sustained winds near 25 knots (29 mph/46 kph).
The Joint Typhoon Warning Center expects Danas to turn to the north. Danas’ center is expected to stay over water until it makes landfall in three days south of Shanghai, China.
