Origins of American Hurricane Names

Hurricane Irene cripple the U.S. East coast region. President Barack Obama called the raging winds reach 90 mph or 144 km / h as ‘historic storm’ that also swept a number of large cities like New York.

Regardless, you may be wondering about the mention of the hurricane which frequently use female names. Before Irene, there is Hurricane Katrina crippled the city of New Orleans in the southeastern United States 2005.

As quoted by ABC News, the names were taken from the list of typhoons that have been made by the World Meteorological Organization. This organization has six separate list of the references to refer to typhoons or hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean. Six lists are rotated every year.

A list prepared by the alphabet will be used as a reference for naming hurricanes that occurred within one year. In the seventh year, the cycle will repeat naming hurricanes. However, the name of the typhoon triggered huge damage like Katrina will be removed from the list so that the name of the typhoon will not appear again in the future.

Here is a list of hurricane names for 2011 in alphabetical order: Arlene, Bret, Cindy, Don, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harvey, Irene, Jose, Katia, Lee, Maria, Nate, Ophelia, Philippe, Rina, Sean, Tammy, Vince , Whitney. That is, the names will be used again for naming hurricanes in 2017.

Excerpted from the website of the National Hurricane Center for the United States, the mention of hurricanes with female names began during World War II. The first is the naming of Typhoon Maria in 1941. The name Maria is taken from the heroic figure in a novel called ‘Storm’, by George Rippey Stewart.

Reference to any hurricanes with female names belanjut exclusively since 1953 until 1978. New thereafter, the world’s meteorological authorities began to let his name on the list even though few in number.

In an international meeting of the World Meteorological Organization agreed that the name of the storm must have a taste of French, Spanish, Dutch, and English. The reason, the storm that threatened to affect weather in many countries. Another rule is to avoid names with the prefix letter T, U, X, Y, and Z because it is considered rare.