[1] During the 1700s, Captain James Cook conducted three voyages within the Pacific Ocean and it is thought that he did not collect any information about or experience any tropical cyclones.
[1] During 1853, Thomas Dobson became the first person to collate information about these systems, in order to attempt to understand and explain the characteristics of 24 tropical cyclones.
[1] During the 1920s Stephen Sargent Visher did some research into tropical cyclones in the Pacific and visited several island nations; including Fiji, Japan and the Philippines to obtain information on potential systems.
[1] Visher also tried to estimate how many systems were occurring on an annual basis in each area, but overcompensated for his incomplete records and came up with a figure of 12 severe tropical cyclones per year.
[1][2] During Visher's time and until the start of World War II, there was insufficient information available to allow for an accurate deception of tropical cyclone tracks.