Katrina, Andrew, Camille, sandy, IKE — because of their devastating effects, these Atlantic hurricanes became world famous. This year the list of famous natural disasters have added to the lethal Harvey, Irma and Jose.
Have you ever wondered on what basis are called hurricanes and how meteorologists determine the name of each of the emerging threats?
The light on this mystery shed Dan Kottlowski, a specialist from Accuweather with 40 years of experience. The weather forecaster explained the algorithm and the principle on which it works.
During the Second world war, the US government noticed that lose a lot of warships in the Western Pacific ocean. The reason was the hurricanes. After the end of hostilities there have been many studies to better understand the nature of natural disasters. At the same time, the military began to assign them names. First used for these purposes only the alphabet, but in 1979 the world meteorological organization decided to standardize the method. Scientists began to call storms human names in alphabetical order, using their duplicate list.
The system works differently, depending on where the element is raging in the Atlantic or the Pacific. For both regions there is a General rule to get the name, the storm must be accompanied by sustained wind speeds of at least 39 mph. Storms with less intense wind referred to as tropical depressions, their names are not assigned.
For Atlantic hurricanes there is a list of 21 names, which alternate in alphabetical order (in the list there are no names beginning with the letters Q, U, X, Y, and Z).
So, this year’s hurricane season opened storm Arlene, followed by Bret, Cindy, don, Emily, Franklin. Today is the turn of Nate — by the weekend he could develop into a hurricane 1 category.
If in a particular year, a list of stops on any letter, for example, R (Rina) in the next year the names of the storms that begin with — S (Sean). During a particularly stormy seasons such as in 2005, the names in the list may not be enough. In such cases, the remaining storms are named in accordance with Greek alphabet.
It is curious that hurricanes with female names are more deadly in nature. There is no mystery — according to a study by the Us national Academy of Sciences, people underestimate the threat, and because of this are often poorly prepared.
