Ioke

This hurricane may have escaped your attention, as so far it has only battered the military base at Johnston Island, 700 miles southwest of Hawaii. Hurricane IOKE is in the middle of the Pacific and has developed into a category 5 hurricane. Sustained windspeeds are 160 mph with gusts up to 190 mph. In metric, this is 260 kph sustained and gusting to 300 kph. For those with a barometer, the pressure in the centre is 921 mbar or about 27 inches. The height of the waves in the centre of the hurricane is 39 ft or nearly 12 m. Ioke is now at position 19.2N 174.3W, 650 miles southsouthwest of Midway. She will move west, across the dateline early on Sunday, and will become Typhoon Ioke. No significant decrease in strength is expected as the storm veers northnorthwest early next week.

Although you can be grateful that this system is nowhere near land, it puts you in awe of nature's force. A hurricane of this magnitude will power all people on earth for - wait for it - 20 years at the rate of energy consumption in 1990. In 1990, mankind consumed 10.000.000.000.000 watts of energy. That is 10 million million watts. Hurricanes are a necessary safety valve to deflect the energy, pumped into the tropics by the sun, towards the temperate latitudes and the polar regions.