Tropical storms and hurricanes have been named in some countries since the 1800’s. Others started naming the storms in early 1930’s but it wasn’t until the mid 1950’s that a “real” system was set in to motion by all the countries that are prone to tropical storms.
Tropical storms are also known as hurricanes, tropical cyclones, typhoons, cyclonic storm, and cyclones depending on the region in which the storm forms.
In the late 1800’s and early 1900’s hurricanes were named after the Saints. This practice took place in the West Indies for a few hundred years.
An Australian forecaster was the first individual to name tropical storms with “human names”. As a television weatherman he was able to voice his opinions of politicians by naming tropical storms after the ones he didn’t like. Using the name of the storm he would include tib bits of information about the politician for example if a politician was having a scandalous affair the weatherman’s report would go something like this. “Hurricane Bob seems to be laying low today after stirring up all those waves yesterday!”
* Pacific Coast
During World War 2, US Army Air Corp and Navy meteorologists names the tropical storms after their wives, girlfriends, children and their mothers.
In the 1960’s they used the names of women only and 1979 they started using both women’s and men’s names.
In 2000 the WMO’s Typhoon Committee, started naming the tropical storms using Asian names only. Names include types of animals, flowers, trees and numerous other everyday items even food.
* Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Sea
Started naming their hurricanes in 1953, using just women’s names. In 1979 they began using men’s names as well and alternating between a women’s name a man’s name. Beginning with names that start with an A and ending with names the start with a W.
Twenty one names are listed for each hurricane season one year will begin with a woman’s name and the next year will begin with a man’s name.
They have six lists of names currently 2007 to 2012; they rotate the six lists so in 2012 they will start over with the list of names from 2007.
If all 21 names are used during a hurricane season, meteorologist will use names from the Greek alphabet which is an additional 25 names.
In the 50 years that tropical storms have been named, there has only been one time when the Greek alphabet names needed to be used, 2005 hurricane season used six names from the Greek alphabet in addition to the 21 one names all ready on the list!
* Why Storms are Named
The reason tropical storms and hurricanes are named is to differentiate between the storms often in one area alone their will be two or more tropical storms. The World Meteorological Organization and the US National Weather Service communicate as well and if you have several tropical storms in different oceans at one time it is helpful to know which storm you’re talking about!
* Retiring Names
The retiring of tropical storm names doesn’t happen very often in extreme case such as Hurricane Katrina and Andrew, Mitch, Gilbert, Wilma. 56 names have been retired since 1958.
A name is retired with there is a substantial loss of life or damage caused by the hurricane.
To view a list of all the tropical storms for the next six years visit the website http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/tcfaq/B2.html.
You will also note that tropical depressions are not named but numbered. This practice allows the meteorologists to keep track of all tropical storm systems to help predict future storm activity.
SOURCES
http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/tcfaq/B1.html#
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/nhc_storms.shtml
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Library/Hurricanes/
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/sju/hrcnhist.html
