NASA
This satellite-based image shows Super Typhoon Sanba in the Philippine Sea on Thursday.
By Miguel Llanos, NBC News
A storm packing 145 mph winds was bearing down on the southern end of Japan's Okinawa Island, where locals and U.S. military personnel were quickly stocking up and battening down.
Typhoon Sanba had winds equivalent to a Category 4 hurricane. (Named storms west of the international dateline in the Northwest Pacific Ocean are called typhoons, not hurricanes.)
Earlier Friday, Sanba's winds had reached 178 mph, making it a "super typhoon" in the jargon of meteorologists. That was the equivalent of a top-rated Category 5 hurricane.
After swiping southern Okinawa this weekend, Sanba is projected to make landfall in South Korea with winds still around 100 mph.
"The center will pass close to Okinawa this weekend and then Sanba, in a less-intense but still potent state, is expected to reach South Korea Sunday night or Monday," weather.com reported.
On Okinawa, the Stars and Stripes news website for U.S. military personnel was reporting that military commissaries were packed with people buying food and emergency supplies.
"We’re already seeing/feeling Super Typhoon Sanba’s most outer bands," the report stated. "If it’s sitting outside the garage, put it inside. If the garage door is still open, shut it. If the trampoline is still up, take it down."
Kadena Air Base, with 18,000 servicemen, is the U.S. facility closest to Sanba and should see winds around 60 mph.
Up to a foot of rain was forecast for the area and satellite data shows that some of Sanba's bands were dumping 3 inches of rain an hour, NASA said in a statement.
Related: Ahead of typhoon, China ships approach islands claimed by Japan
Some 80,000 U.S. citizens are on Okinawa, nearly 30,000 of them U.S. military personnel. Okinawa's total population is some 1.3 million people.
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