Ex-typhoon Halong joins the list of autumn storms in the Bering Sea that produced very high impacts to part of the region. The track of the storm was most unusual, moving nearly due north from the North Pacific, crossing the Aleutians east of Atka, and then to just west of the Pribilofs. From there, the storm made a turn to the right, with the center passing between St. Lawrence Island and the Yukon Delta, all the while intensifying.
This track protected Nome from the highest ocean levels. Now, it's very rare for a strong autumn storm to track so far northeast. Strong storms in the fall typically track farther to the west, say, moving from the western Bering Sea to near or even west of St. Lawrence Island, and then north through the Bering Strait, or the Russian far east, or in a more west to east direction, along or just north of the Aleutians.
A preliminary search of autumn storms over the past 75 years shows only one as intense as ex-Halong that also moved between St. Lawrence Island and the Yukon Delta. That happened in October 1987, while that storm was not an ex-typhoon, it also brought strong winds and some flooding to the YK Delta.
