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Thailand spent the last week under heavy rain warnings. A super typhoon is sitting in the Pacific. The two stories ran side by side in the same news cycles, and a lot of people connected them. They are not connected. The Thai Meteorological Department has been explicit: Dolphin is not expected to affect Thailand directly. A tropical system over Southeast Asian waters. Library image for illustration. It is not live satellite imagery of the storm discussed here — for current imagery use the agency links below. What is actually causing it Two things, both ordinary for the season. A monsoon trough is lying across the upper North and Northeast. And a rather strong southwesterly monsoon is running over the Andaman Sea, Thailand and the Gulf of Thailand. That combination produces exactly what is being observed — heavy to very heavy rain across the North, Northeast, Central region, the East, and down the South's west coast. TMD has warned about flash floods, run-off, landslide...

A projection now has Typhoon Dolphin reaching Japan on 7 August, with very heavy rain aimed at Kumamoto Prefecture, Fukuoka and the surrounding region. If you have a trip booked to Kyushu around that date, the useful question is not how strong the storm will be. It is what specifically stops working, and when. A typhoon approaching the Japanese archipelago. Library image for illustration. It is not live satellite imagery of the storm discussed here — for current imagery use the agency links below. The order things shut down Japan handles typhoons with a well-practised sequence, and it runs roughly in this order: Three to four days out. Nothing visible changes. Forecasters start naming prefectures. Hotels quietly stop taking new bookings for the affected nights. Two days out. Airlines publish waivers. This is the moment your ticket becomes changeable without a fee, and it is the single most useful thing to watch for. One day out. Ferries stop first — always. Then local t...

Updated 1 August 2026 Yesterday the forecast for Dolphin spanned three countries and nobody would commit. Today there is a timeline, and it is specific enough to plan around. Before the details, one piece of housekeeping. On 31 July this site said the cone should compress once the recurve resolved, and that Dolphin would likely weaken well below its peak before reaching land. The first half held. The second is still open — the storm is stronger today than the guidance suggested it would be. A typhoon approaching the Japanese archipelago. Library image for illustration. It is not live satellite imagery of the storm discussed here — for current imagery use the agency links below. Where it is now The Joint Typhoon Warning Center placed Dolphin roughly 181 nautical miles south-southwest of Wake Island , tracking west-northwest at about 13 mph with sustained winds near 165 mph . Satellite presentation is symmetrical with a clean eye. The storm appears to be working through anoth...

Search for this storm today and you will find maps with a confident red line running straight into somebody's coastline. Ignore them. Five days out from a recurving western Pacific typhoon, the honest position is that the destination is unsettled. Japan is on the table. So is Korea. So is a stretch of Chinese coastline a thousand kilometres to the southwest. Understanding why that gap exists is worth more to a traveller than any single arrow. Satellite frames a few hours apart, showing a cyclone's inner core reorganising. Library image for illustration. It is not live satellite imagery of the storm discussed here — for current imagery use the agency links below. The part everyone agrees on Through roughly the second of August, the guidance is tight. Dolphin drifts west-northwest around 20 km/h, stays at the top of the intensity scale, and never comes near a coastline. After that the steering pattern shifts. The storm is expected to swing more due west and accelerate to...

Last updated: July 31, 2026 Super Typhoon Dolphin has reached Category 5 strength over the northwestern Pacific and is now the fifth Category 5 tropical cyclone on the planet this year. Forecast models bring it toward East Asia through the first week of August, with landfall possibilities that currently stretch from eastern China to Japan and South Korea. Here is where the storm is, where it is going, and what the spread in the models actually means if you have travel booked in the region. A mature tropical cyclone with a well-defined eye, seen from orbit. Library image for illustration. It is not live satellite imagery of the storm discussed here — for current imagery use the agency links below. Where Dolphin is right now At midday on July 31, the center of Dolphin was near 18.3°N, 161.9°E — more than 4,200 kilometers east of Luzon in the Philippines. That is still deep ocean, far from any landmass. Maximum sustained winds near the center have exceeded Force ...