In a wild El Nino year, another rare extreme: Tropical Cyclone Chapala nears landfall in Yemen

Late last week, aided by extremely and anomalously warm ocean temperatures, tropical cyclone Chapala rapidly intensified in the Arabian Sea, reaching strong category 4 intensity with maximum sustained winds estimated at 135 knots or 155 miles per hour, as it headed towards the Gulf of Aden and the Arabian peninsula. That appears to be the second strongest storm ever recorded in the Arabian Sea region...This also made Chapala the 23rd category 4 or 5 storm in the northern hemisphere this year — a year that is vastly outdistancing the prior record of 18 in 2004.