The 1939 Pacific typhoon season has no official bounds; it ran year-round in 1939, but most tropical cyclones tend to form in the northwestern Pacific Ocean between May and November. These dates conventionally delimit the period of each year when most tropical cyclones form in the northwestern Pacific Ocean.
The scope of this article is limited to the Pacific Ocean, north of the equator and west of the international date line. Storms that form east of the date line and north of the equator are called hurricanes; see 1939 Pacific hurricane season. Storms in the season were tracked by the United States Weather Bureau and released in the Monthly Weather Review under the header "Typhoons and Depressions over the Far East". The Monthly Weather Review only covers tropical cyclones west of 150° E. Due to lack of satellites and ship reports due to the Pacific Theatre of World War II, it is possible other tropical cyclones existed, especially if they were short-lived or of minor intensity.
There were 29 known tropical cyclones, including 24 of typhoon status, of which several of the storms were deadly. A typhoon in November was the deadliest cyclone of the season, causing 49 deaths as it crossed the Philippines. The same typhoon later struck Hong Kong, where the Hong Kong Observatory recorded the first period of calm during the eye of a cyclone. At least 151 people were killed during the season, with 12 missing and unconfirmed of their status during some point during the season.
Famous quotes containing the words pacific and/or season:
“I need not tell you of the inadequacy of the American shipping marine on the Pacific Coast.... For this reason it seems to me that there is no subject to which Congress can better devote its attention in the coming session than the passage of a bill which shall encourage our merchant marine in such a way as to establish American lines directly between New York and the eastern ports and South American ports, and both our Pacific Coast ports and the Orient and the Philippines.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“At Christmas I no more desire a rose
Than wish a snow in May’s new-fangled shows,
But like of each thing that in season grows.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)