Portal:Tropical cyclones

Cyclonic Storm Komen (/ˈkoʊ.mɛn/) was an unusual tropical cyclone that originated near the southern coast of Bangladesh and later struck the same country while drifting over the northern Bay of Bengal. The second named storm of the 2015 season, Komen brought several days of heavy rainfall to Myanmar, Bangladesh, and India. It formed as a depression on July 26 over the Ganges delta and moved in a circular motion around the northern Bay of Bengal. Komen intensified into a 75 km/h (45 mph) cyclonic storm and moved ashore southeastern Bangladesh on July 30. The system turned westward over land and was last noted over eastern India on August 2.

Across its path, Komen dropped torrential rainfall, primarily in northwestern Myanmar where the precipitation totaled at 840 mm (33 in) in Paletwa. The rains compounded ongoing flooding and contributed to the worst flooding in the country in a century. About 1.7 million people were forced to evacuate as flood waters inundated houses to their rooftops. About 510,000 houses in the country were damaged or destroyed, and many residents lost their source of income as 667,221 acres (270,015 hectares) of crop fields were damaged. The floods killed 132 people, with at least 39 fatalities directly related to Komen. The government requested assistance from the international community to cope with the disaster, considered the worst in the country since Cyclone Nargis in 2008. Elsewhere, the storm's flooding damaged 88,900 houses in Bangladesh and covered crop fields for a week; Komen killed 45 people in the country, some of them due to illnesses spread following the storm. Later, floodwaters affected southeastern India, killing 103 people and damaging or destroying 476,046 houses. (Full article...)

In Virginia, Hurricane Isabel became the costliest disaster in the history of Virginia. Hurricane Isabel formed from a tropical wave on September 6, 2003, in the tropical Atlantic Ocean. It moved northwestward, and within an environment of light wind shear and warm waters it steadily strengthened to reach peak winds of 265 km/h (165 mph) on September 11. After fluctuating in intensity for four days, Isabel gradually weakened and made landfall on the Outer Banks of North Carolina with winds of 165 km/h (103 mph) on September 18. It quickly weakened over land as it passed through central Virginia, and Isabel became extratropical over western Pennsylvania on September 19.

Strong winds from the hurricane affected 99 counties and cities in the state, which downed thousands of trees and left about 1.8 million without power. The storm surge impacted much of the southeastern portion of the state, peaking at around 9 feet (2.7 m) in Richmond along the James River; the surge caused significant damage to homes along riverways. The nationwide maximum rainfall total from the hurricane was 20.2 inches (510 mm) in Sherando, Virginia. In the state's mountainous region, heavy rainfall caused severe and damaging flash flooding. The hurricane caused about $1.85 billion (2003 USD, $2.17 billion 2008 USD) in damage and 36 deaths in the state—10 directly from the storm's effects and 22 indirectly related. (Full article...)

The 1988 Pacific hurricane season was the least active Pacific hurricane season since 1981. It officially began May 15, in the eastern Pacific, and June 1, in the central Pacific and lasted until November 30. These dates conventionally delimit the period of each year when most tropical cyclones form in the northeastern Pacific Ocean. The first named storm, Tropical Storm Aletta, formed on June 16, and the last-named storm, Tropical Storm Miriam, was previously named Hurricane Joan in the Atlantic Ocean before crossing Central America and re-emerging in the eastern Pacific; Miriam continued westward and dissipated on November 2.

The season produced 23 tropical depressions, of which 15 attained tropical storm status. Seven storms reached hurricane status, three of which became major hurricanes. The strongest storm of the season, Hurricane Hector, formed on July 30 to the south of Mexico and reached peak winds of 145 mph (233 km/h)—Category 4 status—before dissipating over open waters on August 9; Hector was never a threat to land. Tropical Storm Gilma was the only cyclone in the season to make landfall, crossing the Hawaiian Islands, although there were numerous near-misses. Gilma's Hawaiian landfall was unusual, but not unprecedented. There were also two systems that successfully crossed over from the Atlantic: the aforementioned Joan / Miriam and Hurricane Debby, which became Tropical Depression Seventeen-E, making the 1988 season the first on record in which more than one tropical cyclone has crossed between the Atlantic and Pacific basins intact. Three systems caused deaths: Tropical Storm Aletta caused one death in southwestern Mexico, Hurricane Uleki caused two drownings off the coast of Oahu as it passed by the Hawaiian Islands, and Hurricane Kristy caused 21 deaths in the Mexican states of Oaxaca and Chiapas. (Full article...)

Italicized basins are unofficial.

North Atlantic (2026)

No active systems

East and Central Pacific (2026)

No active systems

West Pacific (2026)

No active systems

North Indian Ocean (2026)

No active systems

Mediterranean (2025–26)

No active systems

South-West Indian Ocean (2025–26)

Tropical Depression 12

Australian region (2025–26)

No active systems

South Pacific (2025–26)

No active systems

South Atlantic (2025–26)

No active systems

Last updated: 05:11, 14 March 2026 (UTC)

March 15

• 1889 - A cyclone passed over Apia, Samoa, wrecking 6 naval ships moored there, killing at least 147 American and German sailors.
• 1986 - Cyclone Honorinina struck eastern Madagascar, killing 99 people.
• 2019 – One of the worst tropical cyclones to affect Africa, Cyclone Idai (pictured) made landfall over Mozambique. Idai killed over 1,300 people with more than 2,000 people missing. With estimated damages of US$2.2 billion, Idai also became the costliest tropical cyclone in the South-West Indian Ocean basin, as well as the costliest natural disaster in Africa.

March 16

• 1981 - Cyclone Max reached its peak intensity with a central pressure of 960 hPa (mbar). Max had earlier passed directly over Darwin, the first cyclone to directly affect the city since Cyclone Tracy.
• 2018 - Tropical Storm Eliakim (pictured) moved ashore eastern Madagascar, producing heavy rainfall that killed 21 people.

March 17

• 1997 - Cyclone Justin reached peak intensity while meandering southeast of Papua New Guinea; its heavy rainfall killed 34 people.
• 2012 - Cyclone Lua (pictured) made landfall in Western Australia, closing oil fields and causing heavy flooding damage.

• …that the Australian region have three distinct lists of names for tropical storms, each one of them being administered by agencies in Australia, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, respectively?
• …that the Joint Typhoon Warning Center considers that Typhoon Vera (pictured) of 1986 is actually two distinct systems, formed from two separated low-level circulations?
• …that Cyclone Freddy (track pictured) in 2023 was the longest-lasting tropical cyclone recorded?
• …that the typhoons of 2024—Yinxing, Toraji, Usagi, and Man-yi (pictured)—made history as the first recorded instance since 1951 of four tropical cyclones coexisting in November?