Keeping Tack of the Weather on Erabu

Being on an island, we`re prone to get typhoons (pronounced taifuu, in Japanese). Especially now, we are in the prime season for them.

Today, I`m experiencing the first semi-typhoon. It`s not quite a tropical depression, but it`s called a tropical storm with winds getting about 40 mph.

I tried to watch the Japanese version of the weather channel today, with minimal understanding. Everything was in kanji, which are the Chinese characters used in addition with Japanese-created characters. I could figure out that there was a typhoon or something like that and could see the five day forecast for this.

When I got to work, my co-workers let me know that it was not a typhoon (much to my relief), but a storm with close to typhoon-strength winds.

Unfortunately, the WeatherChannel website doesn`t list my island as a location, only Okinawa. And Okinawa, while closer than mainland Japan is still about a 7-hour ferry away. So, I`ve been really looking for a website that would display the weather for my island.

That`s when I found a website called `Weather Undergound`. You can find it by clicking here or by typing: weatherundergound.com

I found out that Tropical Storm Five is making it ways north and its outlying storms are currently hitting the island. It`s pretty windy here, but all my co-workers aren`t acting like this is anything out of the ordinary.

But, if you want to look at the weather on my island or track Tropical Storm Five or (another name) Tropical Storm Dianmu, just click on the link (which will direct you to Weather Undergound`s page for Okinoerabu.

I`ll post pictures from the Matsuri (festival) tonnight!

Steph