Super typhoon Ioke is barreling towards Wake Island (Military, civilians & contractors evacuating)

KHON TV and KHNL TV ^ | August 27, 2006

[HAL9000]

KHON TV -

Super typhoon Ioke is barreling towards Wake Island

It's big and packing quite a punch. Super typhoon Ioke is barreling towards Wake Island.

The massive storm is churning around in the central pacific. It's packing winds of more than 160 miles per hour, a category five storm.

Roy Matsuda from the Central Pacific Hurricane Center says, "it is projected to go along this track toward wake island as you can see and to reach Wake Island approximately Wednesday afternoon our time within 13 nautical miles."

And because of that a team from Hawaii will head to Wake Island to help evacuate about 200 people before super typhoon Ioke hits.

Military and civilian personnel on Wake Island support US pacific command operations. The base also serves as an emergency airfield.

Two c-17 planes are scheduled to leave tomorrow morning to pick up the evacuees.

We'll have a videographer heading with the team to Wake Island, and will bring you a full report when they return to Hawaii.

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KHNL TV -

Hickam Airman To Evacuate Hundreds From Wake Island

(KHNL) Two C-17 Globemaster III aircraft will depart from Hickam within 24 hours to evacuate approximately 200 military, DoD civilians and contractors from Wake Island.

Hickam Air Force Base C-17 Crewmembers are preparing to rescue those working on Wake Island.

Hurricane Ioke is expected to reach Wake Island within 72 hours; the evacuation mission will need to be completed prior to the expected storm surge.

Wake Island supports U.S. Pacific Command major regional taskings. The base provides facilities, vehicles, aerospace ground equipment and aviation fuel to sustain aircraft for combat operations.

It also provides for the bed down of forces and emergency divert airfield operations.

Some tour groups offer treks of WWII historical sites and aircraft.

According to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center, Hurricane Ioke has been reclassified as Super Typhoon Ioke.

[golfdisc]

Anyone know if Ioke is headed towards Hawaii and if so what is ETA?

[tmc8492]

Ioke is heading west toward Wake Island then on to Japan or China, no chance of it heading toward Hawaii.

[tmc8492]

After working on Johnston Island for 11 years from November 1991 to November 2002 here's a little history on the "Rock" as we referred to it. The Island or atoll originally consisted of two small islands and a main reef, Johnston Island was only 64 acres in size with a smaller outlying island call "Sand Island" of only 3 to 4 acres in size. It was primarily used to mine guano or bird droppings in the early part of the 1900's then in the 30's the military dredged it up to about 350 acres and placed a small airstrip on it. It was briefly attacked by a Japanese submarine shortly after Pearl Harbor of which the military claims to have shelled and sunk. During the late 40's, 50's, and early 60's when the U.S. was doing it's Pacific testing of nuclear weapons, Johnston was the launch site of the atmospheric testing where they would launch and detonate nukes in the upper atmosphere. This is where the Electromagnetic Pulse Theory or EMP was proven to disrupt electronic signals and fry an enemies communication system if it wasn't shielded. During this time the Atoll was dredged more extensively to expand Johnston Island to it's current size of 625 acres and two artificial island were also added. In 1961 or 1962 when a Thor rocket was being launched, a malfunction was detected and the rocket was aborted on the launch pad, though the warhead did not detonated, it was shattered in many radioactive pieces and contaminated parts of the island. These areas were fenced off and for the next 40 years the military cleaned up the contamination down to acceptable levels (don't ask what an acceptable level is). An interesting note on Johnston Island is before President Kennedy signed the Test Ban Treaty in 1963 with Russia banning all atmospheric testing, the last Atomospheric test of a nuclear weapon by the U.S. was launched from Johnston Island. After that everything went underground at the Nevada Test Sites. The chemical weapons were brought in from the 60's through the early 90's from all over the pacific and even from Europe. They built a special incineration plant to destroy these weapons for the U.S. Army and the last munition was destroyed in November of 2000. Over the next 4 years the base was shut down and all but one of the buildings and some bunkers were demolished. The island is administered by the Air Force and is a National Wildlife Refuge for birds, monk seals, sea turtles, etc.. Fish & Wildlife has jurisdiction on this. There are no more personnel on the island, the runway is shutdown, no fresh water or any other facilities to support human habitat unless they bring it with them buy boat. There is much more information on Johnston Atoll and if your curious about the testing the U.S. did in the pacific I can recommend a video called "Trinity & Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie" narriated by William Shatner (yes, good ole Cpt. Kirk).

[conservative in nyc]

Thanks for the info. I guess this settles the inhabited or uninhabited question.

[Rb ver. 2.0]

" Johnson Atoll is for sale,"

Nothing like a former nerve gas inceneration site to stigmatize a property.

[conservative in nyc]

Here's an update. Wake Island has been evacuated and Ioke is expected to make a pretty direct hit:

Category 5 hurricane Ioke (ee-OH'-kay), the 12th typhoon this year, continued westward as it passed the international dateline, packing winds of 160 mph and gusts up to 185 mph. It will begin tracking northwest and strike Wake Island at about 02:00 GMT on 31 August.

The typhoon force winds near the center of Ioke will continue to send large north and northeast waves towards the Marshall islands, said the latest National Weather Service storm advisory, issued Tuesday, August 28, 8:00 p.m. Guam time (11:00 p.m. Majuro time)

The U.S. Airforce evacuated all 200 workers from Wake yesterday. The eye of the typhoon could come within three miles of Wake by Wednesday at 2:00 p.m. The 18-ft to 40-ft storm surges may submerge the small island which is only 18-ft at its highest level and destroy eveything that is not made of concrete, said a NWS forecaster in Hawaii according, reported AP.

Tuesday night, the center of super typhoon Ioke, tracking west-northwest at 9 mph, was located near latitude 16.3 degrees north and longitude 173.0 degrees east. This is about 470 miles east-southeast of Wake Island, 420 miles north-northeast of Utirik and and 770 miles east-northeast of Enewetak, and 645 miles north of Majuro.

The typhoon center is expected to stay well-north of the Marshall Islands. Current advisories include hazardous surf of 10 to 12 feet along east and northeast facing reefs of Utirik, Wotje and Enewetak.

According to a NWS forecaster, Ioke is currently ranked the fifth-strongest storm ever seen in the Central Pacific in the Central Pacific, and is the first Category 5 storm in the region since 1994.

Typhoon Ioke is one of the longest-sustained storms in world history, having stayed at Category 4 for a week.

Ioke hit Johnston Atoll on August 23 with winds of 105 mph, and gusts of up to 125 mph. Thirteen people aboard a Air Force research vessel took shelter on Johnston in a concrete shelter designed for Category 4 storms.

[Rb ver. 2.0]

Wake island is accessible via private tour groups.
http://www.stephenambrosetours.com/tours/wakeisland-it.html

I know there's other vendors out there if you search for them. I recall seeing a bird tour group planning a trip there once.

[investigateworld]

Trivia: What future US President bombed this island?

[neodad]

George H.W. Bush

[investigateworld]

Correct!

I think he was a whole 18 or 19 YOA at the time.

[Minn]

Wow! Thanks a million. I get a newseletter from a Wake club and they can never get permission to visit. I might be on that trip.

[Minn]

Wow! Thanks a million. I get a newseletter from a Wake club and they can never get permission to visit. I might be on that trip.

[Hawthorn]

"Aren't Filipinos in that hazy area between Asian and Polynesian?"

They are mostly of Malay racial stock, with a touch of Chinese and Spanish blood for good measure.

[They're definitely not Polynesians, even though the Malay and Polynesian languages do share a common root in ancient times.]

Nicest and politest people in the world. I love 'em!

[kingu]

This was a recent water vapor image of Ioke. It still boggles my mind comparing the latitude lines to where I live, and how much territory it would cover were it in the United States.

There's one choice for anything in this beast's way right now - Move.

[conservative in nyc]

Wow! And they did evacuate: Wake Island evacuates as super typhoon bears down.

[kingu]

Searched for Ioke, not Wake, or I would have posted it over there. An incredible image, that's for sure.

[kingu]

I showed my wife and her first reaction (after picking up her jaw off the ground - those lines are two degrees apart, this thing would cover California) was 'Well, now we know what happened to Rove's storm machine. He left it on vacation in the Pacific.'

[ratt]

"Cool! Is it stripped inside?" well, i arrived on guam in '97. we were responsible for the maintenance (sheetmetal, structural and washing) for the static displays and any transient aircraft that broke there as well. when i got there, there were a couple old bomber jackets and flight helmets still in the cockpit along with some other period specific paraphenalia. typhoon paka tore one of the flaps and half of the rudder off the B-52. so we rebuilt it. during that process, we noticed toward the end there were beer bottles and other evidence that someone had been inside the aircraft. we had the only set of keys that i knew of. the only other entry point was through the wheelwells. so we covered them up with some sheetmetal. but before we finished, the jackets etc. were missing. tragic loss of some historical items if you ask me. as far as the aircraft being stripped... the engines are still intact as well as all instrumentation in the cockpit. I am sure that after all these years sitting there, it is not functional. i actually talked to the retired pilot who claimed to have flown the jet there for it's final flight. he told me that they landed and taxiid right up on the grass in the park where it now sits anchored to steel stands on a large concrete slab. it is a shame to lose something like the items inside the aircraft to what i believe was just a couple teenagers having fun.

[isawitonline]

http://philadelphiaweather.blogspot.com/2006/08/super-typhoon-ioke-bears-down-on-wake.html There is some information on Ioke's history in the Central Pacific that I found at the Central Pacific Hurricane Center. Also a couple of satellite shots, etc. This is a great storm to track and thankfully is only having minimal impact on life and property (two islands so far). One computer model, for what it's worth, has been putting Ioke on a collison course with Japan in about a week.

[isawitonline]

http://philadelphiaweather.blogspot.com/2006/08/super-typhoon-ioke-bears-down-on-wake.html
There's the link (it was unfortunately buried in the text, I apologize)