Typhoon Lan path, 2023

Western North Pacific basin, 6 August 2023 to 18 August 2023. Its recorded track is shown on the map and selected for you.

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Years1842 to 2026
Ocean basin

Choosing a minimum category hides storms with no wind speed in the record. To see which storms have passed near you, search a town or ZIP code, or tap the map.

Key
  • Tropical depression Winds below 34 knots (39 mph)
  • Tropical storm 34 to 63 knots (39 to 73 mph)
  • Category 1 64 to 82 knots (74 to 95 mph)
  • Category 2 83 to 95 knots (96 to 110 mph)
  • Category 3 96 to 112 knots (111 to 129 mph), major
  • Category 4 113 to 136 knots (130 to 156 mph), major
  • Category 5 137 knots (157 mph) or more, major
  • Unknown intensity No wind speed in the record
  • Post-tropical Storm has become post-tropical (dashed line)

How to read the lines. Each line is the track of one storm, drawn through its six-hourly positions and coloured by its intensity at each point (the Saffir-Simpson scale), so a line changes colour as the storm strengthens or weakens. Tap a line for its details, or tap anywhere else to see which storms have passed nearby. Weaker storms appear as you zoom in. Hurricanes, typhoons and cyclones are the same kind of storm with different names in different oceans.

What the record says

Lan was a typhoon in the Western North Pacific basin that lasted about 12 days, from 6 August 2023 to 18 August 2023. Its peak was Category 4 (120 kt) on 11 August 2023, with a 1-minute sustained wind of 120 kt (138 mph, 222 km/h). Its lowest recorded pressure was 940 hPa.

  • Category 4peak intensity
  • 120 ktpeak wind (138 mph)
  • 940 hPalowest pressure
  • 12 dayslifetime

Source of the peak wind: US Joint Typhoon Warning Center (western Pacific). The regional forecast centre (RSMC Tokyo (Japan Meteorological Agency)) gave a peak of 90 kt on its own averaging convention (10-minute winds), so the two figures differ.

It has its own page because it reached category 4 or stronger.

This page gives the official record's figures. It does not describe the human cost of the storm, which is far larger than any wind speed or pressure here.

Where it came ashore

  • 15 August 2023: Japan (55 kt)

A landfall here is the first tropical position over land after time at sea, so it is within about six hours of the real event. The record shows up to 8.

Countries it came within 50 km of

Strongest effect first.

How to read this track

The line joins the storm's six-hourly positions with straight lines, coloured by its intensity at each point, so it shows how the storm strengthened and weakened. The real path curved between the positions. A dashed grey stretch means the storm had become post-tropical. Records before the satellite era (about the 1960s) are estimates.

Source: NOAA NCEI IBTrACS, public domain. See data sources and caveats.

Other notable storms of the 2023 Western North Pacific season

Other notable storms near Japan

  • Nancy (1961)6 September 1961 to 20 September 1961, peak Category 5 (185 kt), 890 hPa
  • Violet (1961)2 October 1961 to 11 October 1961, peak Category 5 (180 kt), 895 hPa
  • Ida (1958)20 September 1958 to 29 September 1958, peak Category 5 (175 kt), 877 hPa
  • Kit (1966)20 June 1966 to 3 July 1966, peak Category 5 (170 kt), 880 hPa
  • Grace (1958)27 August 1958 to 9 September 1958, peak Category 5 (165 kt), 905 hPa

The 2023 Western North Pacific season · All notable storms

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