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April 15, 2026 - Super Typhoon Sinlaku
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In mid-April 2026, a powerful typhoon bore down on the Mariana Islands in the North Pacific Ocean. The storm, Super Typhoon Sinlaku, was notable for reaching such exceptional strength so early in the year.
The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured this true-color image on April 13, 2026, as Sinlaku approached the islands. Near that time, the storm carried sustained winds of around 280 kilometers per hour (175 miles per hour). That places it as a violent typhoon—the highest intensity on the scale used by the Japan Meteorological Agency and equivalent to a category 5 storm on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale.
The storm continued along its northwest track toward the Marianas on the morning of April 14, as storm bands began to bring heavy rain to the islands of Saipan, Tinian, and Rota, according to an update from the National Weather Service. Forecasts called for typhoon conditions to affect Saipan and Tinian from April 14 into April 15 before subsiding to tropical storm conditions.
Sinlaku is the second category 5 tropical cyclone of 2026, following Horacio, which churned over the South Indian Ocean in late February. Meteorologists note that Sinlaku is also one of only a handful of category 5 typhoons—a tropical cyclone that occurs in the Northwestern Pacific Ocean—known to have occurred so early in the year.
Image Facts
Satellite:
Terra
Date Acquired: 4/13/2026
Resolutions:
1km (357.3 KB), 500m (1.1 MB), 250m (3.2 MB)
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit:
MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC
In mid-April 2026, a powerful typhoon bore down on the Mariana Islands in the North Pacific Ocean. The storm, Super Typhoon Sinlaku, was notable for reaching such exceptional strength so early in the year.
The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured this true-color image on April 13, 2026, as Sinlaku approached the islands. Near that time, the storm carried sustained winds of around 280 kilometers per hour (175 miles per hour). That places it as a violent typhoon—the highest intensity on the scale used by the Japan Meteorological Agency and equivalent to a category 5 storm on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale.
The storm continued along its northwest track toward the Marianas on the morning of April 14, as storm bands began to bring heavy rain to the islands of Saipan, Tinian, and Rota, according to an update from the National Weather Service. Forecasts called for typhoon conditions to affect Saipan and Tinian from April 14 into April 15 before subsiding to tropical storm conditions.
Sinlaku is the second category 5 tropical cyclone of 2026, following Horacio, which churned over the South Indian Ocean in late February. Meteorologists note that Sinlaku is also one of only a handful of category 5 typhoons—a tropical cyclone that occurs in the Northwestern Pacific Ocean—known to have occurred so early in the year.
Image Facts
Satellite:
Terra
Date Acquired: 4/13/2026
Resolutions:
1km (357.3 KB), 500m (1.1 MB), 250m (3.2 MB)
Bands Used: 1,4,3
Image Credit:
MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC
