Super Typhoon Champi is a pageant of power, a Category 5-equivalent beast that as of Wednesday morning Eastern was swirling with sustained eyewall winds up to 170 mph and gusts topping 200 mph.
The storm, located a little more than 500 miles east of the northern Philippines, has been taking advantage of ideal conditions for tropical cyclone sustenance and strengthening. Those include hot water temperatures of 86 to 88 degrees, as well as weak upper-level winds that allow the storm to develop without being knocked off-kilter.