Submarines -- 'Use them to bust typhoons'

Japanese engineering firm Ise Kogyo says it believes a fleet of 20 underwater submarines could draw the sting from a typhoon at sea by cooling the temperature of the ocean directly beneath it.

The thousands affected across Asia by Typhoon Fanapi this week will likely have mixed reactions when they hear of an off-the-wall scheme designed to prevent further disasters by sucking the power from devastating storms before they can make landfall.

Although the plan comes too late for Fanapi’s victims, if activated could change the way future typhoons are approached if there’s any merit at all in its somewhat James Bond approach to storm-busting.

It would do so by pumping cold water from 30 meters below the surface to sea level and depriving the storm of the water temperature needed to drive it onward, potentially towards land.

Ise Kogyo says, rather specifically, that its fleet could cool 57,600 square meters of ocean by three degrees, thereby effectively downgrading any typhoon and making it a lot less threatening.

While the underwater storm defense mechanism is still on the drawing board, the hydraulic pipe specialist is actively looking for help in developing a seagoing prototype. Anyone with 20 spare subs knows where to go.