Typhoon Sarah, 19561

Abstract

Typhoon Sarah, 1956, the first of the season, was unusual in several respects. First, Sarah formed in a tropical depression that first became a closed circulation less than a hundred miles from the equator. Second, Sarah showed a marked diurnal variation in intensity after reaching a maximum of intensity on the second day as a typhoon. Third, besides the diurnal variation there were two periods of intensification and weakening. Fourth, the cyclone retrograded to the east-southeast several hundred miles parallel to its previous track. The diurnal variation of Typhoon Sarah appears to have its origin in the arrival of short intense lines of convergence at the eye. The arrival of these lines of convergence at the eye furnished the energy that gave the typhoon a pulsating characteristic.