How and why hurricanes are named. Why are hurricanes called women's names? History, interesting facts Hurricanes are called by female names alphabetically

Hurricanes are given names. This is done in order not to confuse them, especially when several tropical cyclones operate in the same area of ​​the world, so that there are no misunderstandings in weather forecasting, in issuing storm alerts and warnings.

Prior to the first naming system for hurricanes, hurricanes were given their names randomly and randomly. Sometimes the hurricane was named after the saint on whose day the disaster occurred. So, for example, the hurricane Santa Anna, which reached the city of Puerto Rico on July 26, 1825, received its name, on St. Anna. The name could be given according to the area that suffered the most from the elements. Sometimes the name was determined by the very form of development of the hurricane. So, for example, the hurricane "Pin" No. 4 got its name in 1935, the shape of the trajectory of which resembled the mentioned object.

An original method of naming hurricanes, invented by Australian meteorologist Clement Rugg, is known: he named typhoons after members of parliament who refused to vote for weather research loans.

The names of cyclones were widely used during the Second World War. Air force meteorologists naval forces The United States has been monitoring typhoons in the Pacific Northwest. To avoid confusion, military meteorologists named typhoons after their wives or mother-in-laws. After the war, the US National Weather Service compiled alphabetical list female names. The main idea of ​​this list was to use short, simple and easy to remember names.

By 1950, the first system in the names of hurricanes appeared. At first they chose the phonetic army alphabet, and in 1953 they decided to return to FEMALE NAMES. Subsequently, the assignment of female names to hurricanes entered the system and was extended to other tropical cyclones - to Pacific typhoons, storms indian ocean, the Timor Sea and the northwest coast of Australia.

I had to streamline the naming procedure itself. So, the first hurricane of the year began to be called a female name, starting with the first letter of the alphabet, the second - with the second, etc. The names were chosen to be short, easy to pronounce and easy to remember. For typhoons, there was a list of 84 female names. In 1979, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), in conjunction with the US National Weather Service, expanded this list to include male names.

Since there are several basins where hurricanes form, there are also several lists of names. There are 6 alphabetical lists for Atlantic Basin hurricanes, each with 21 names, used for 6 consecutive years and then repeated. If there are more than 21 Atlantic hurricanes in a year, the Greek alphabet will come into play.

In the event that a typhoon is particularly destructive, the name given to it is struck off the list and replaced by another. So the name KATRINA is forever crossed off the list of meteorologists.

In the Pacific Northwest, typhoons have the names of animals, flowers, trees, and even foods: Nakri, Yufung, Kanmuri, Kopu. The Japanese refused to give female names to the deadly typhoons, because they consider women there to be gentle and quiet creatures. And the tropical cyclones of the northern Indian Ocean remain nameless.

Hurricanes, tornadoes, storms, typhoons, cyclones- These are natural phenomena of the same order, similar in their characteristics. Hurricane-like storms in the Atlantic Ocean are called hurricanes, V pacific ocean – typhoons, in the Indian Ocean cyclones.

Hurricane- this is a wind that twists into several spirals at high speed.

If someone gets into the epicenter of a hurricane, they will first feel strong wind, then heavy rain. When the epicenter of the hurricane shifts, calm weather and clear skies will follow. After some time, heavy rain will again pour and a strong wind will blow. Only the wind will blow in the opposite direction.

Storm- a very strong wind, as well as a lot of excitement at sea.

Tornado (tornado) – atmospheric vortex, arising in a thundercloud and spreading down, often to the very surface of the earth, in the form of a cloud sleeve or trunk with a diameter of tens and hundreds of meters. It's the wind great strength. Tornadoes occur most frequently in North America, up to 200 annually. Tornadoes destroy houses and engineering structures. The speed of movement of a tornado can be 100 km / h.

Events

Undoubtedly, everyone paid attention to how simple and, at times, tender names called hurricanes by researchers around the world.

It would seem that all the names are random. Take at least born over Atlantic Ocean Hurricane Earl(can be translated as Hurricane "Count"), which raged last year over the Bahamas, the islands of Puerto Rico and along East Coast USA.

Or Tropical Storm Fiona, which, as they say, "walked" shoulder to shoulder next to Hurricane Earl.

However, the system itself, by which hurricanes and storms are given specific names, has a long and rather complicated history.

"What's in a name?!"

As reported in US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), once hurricanes were given the names of saints.

Moreover, the saint was not chosen by chance, but depending on the day on which this or that hurricane formed.

For example, it appeared Hurricane Saint Anna, which arose on July 26, 1825, the day of St. Anne.

You may ask how scientists acted if hurricanes were born, for example, on the same day, but on different years? In this case, the "younger" hurricane was assigned a serial number in addition to the name of the saint.

Eg, Hurricane San Felipe struck Puerto Rico on September 13th, 1876, Saint Philip's day. Another hurricane that hit the same area also started on September 13th. But already in 1928. A later hurricane was named Hurricane San Felipe II.

A little later, the system for naming hurricanes changed, and scientists began to use the location of the hurricane to designate it, that is, the width and longitude.

However, according to NOAA, this method of naming did not catch on due to the fact that it was far from always possible to accurately and unambiguously determine the coordinates of the place of origin of one or another hurricane.

The inconsistent and contradictory radio reports coming in on this topic sometimes required a long and thorough study and screening.

So the hurricane may end up "dying" nameless while scientists calculate its coordinates to give the natural disaster a name using this method!

Therefore, the United States of America abandoned such a system in 1951 in favor of a seemingly very simple and effective alphabetical naming convention proposed by the military.

True, this method used not the usual, but the phonetic alphabet. It was then that they were born Hurricanes Able, Baker and Charlie, in the names of which there was one pattern - the first letters of the hurricanes corresponded to the letters English alphabet A, B, C.

However, as it turned out, hurricanes arose more often than new ideas came to the head of scientists, and the number of tornadoes in a fairly short period of time clearly exceeded the number of letters and sounds in English language!

To avoid confusion, forecasters began using names of people in 1953.. Each name had to be approved by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Hurricane Center. (NOAA's National Hurricane Center).

Initially, all hurricanes were assigned female names. The name of the very first hurricane that was named using this technique is Hurricane Maria.

This destructive natural phenomenon received such a beautiful female name in honor of the heroine of the novel. "Storm", which was written by the American novelist and scholar George Rippey Stewart in 1941.

As told to the magazine "Little secrets of life" (Life "s Little Mysteries) representative of the National Hurricane Center Dennis Feltgen, "in 1979, someone had the wise idea to use male names for hurricanes and since then they have been used along with female"

"You call him like me!"

Nowadays, hurricane names are chosen in Geneva, at the headquarters World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

This specialized intergovernmental agency is responsible for monitoring six weather regions in the world, including the United States of America, which forms the fourth region.

It includes North America, South America and the Caribbean.

Especially for Atlantic tropical storms, The National Hurricane Center has created six hurricane name lists., which was discussed and approved by the WMO by voting at a special meeting of the international committee.

These lists contain French, Spanish, German and English names, because, according to experts from NOAA, "The elements also strike at other nations, and hurricanes are monitored, studied and recorded in many countries".

These six lists of names are in constant rotation and new lists are regularly approved.

For example, in 2010, a list of names was approved, which, according to forecasts, will be used only in 2016.

Initially, the lists of hurricane names included names from A to Z (for example, among the hurricanes that raged in 1958, you can find such names - Udele, Virgy, Wilna, Xrae, Yurith and Zorna (Udele, Virgy, Wilna, Xrae, Yurith and Zorna)).

According to Feltgen, the letters Q, U, X and Z are not used in the current lists due to the fact that there are simply not enough names that begin with these letters.

However, sometimes changes are also made to the currently used lists. If the storm or hurricane was particularly destructive (for example, as Hurricane Katrina 2005), the WMO determines by special vote whether the name should be used to designate hurricanes in the future.

If one or another name is excluded from the list, it is decided to use another name starting with the same letter of the alphabet. This name is also carefully selected and approved by popular vote.

The names that are used in these lists can be arbitrarily unusual, or, on the contrary, well-known and familiar to everyone.

For example, the names planned for the 2010 hurricanes contained names such as Gaston, Otto, Shary and Virgine (Gaston, Otto, Shary and Virgine).

Do all storms have names? No, only special hurricanes get this honor! Namely, those who the funnel rotates counterclockwise, and the wind speed inside the hurricane is at least 63 kilometers per hour.

Then such a "lucky one" is assigned the next name from the list of names of hurricanes approved for this year.

These days, it's not hard to name a distant star after yourself, your girlfriend, or your favorite hamster. And what about a tropical cyclone that can destroy several cities in a day, flood regions and cause billions in damage to the country? Why are destructive hurricanes called more often female names? Over the past 150 years, scientists have assigned their own names to all major cyclones. Often these names were associated with racism, sexism, personal preferences or a thirst for revenge. It took a long time before there was a unified system.

After Ragge's death in 1922, his system fell into disuse. Hurricanes began to be named according to geographical features or caused great damage. Thus, the 1911 Ship Cyclone and the 1938 New England Hurricane appeared. The lack of clarity in such a system often led to confusion and overlaps.

One reason hurricanes are given female names, scientists say, is 'unpredictability' natural phenomena. Motivated by this, US feminists began to speak out against the tradition of female names in the names of storms.

The dangerous element brings not only destruction, but also pushes people of art to create
, . Probably, many people know the painting "The Ninth Wave" by Aivazovsky, but few people know.

Why are hurricanes given human names? Here is Kirill, Kirill, damn it, recently trampled across Europe, Katrina in America that year ... Why

Hurricanes are given names. This is done in order not to confuse them, especially when several tropical cyclones operate in the same area of ​​the world. Names are selected by the World Meteorological Organization according to a certain rule. And the rule is this ─ the name of the first hurricane of the year begins with the first letter of the English alphabet ─ A, the second gets a name with the letter B, and so on. The alternation of female and male names is also obligatory. For example, in 1998 the Atlantic hurricanes were named Alex, Bonnie, Charlie, Daniela, and so on.
The custom of naming typhoons and hurricanes by female names arose relatively recently. Previously, they received their names randomly and randomly. Sometimes a hurricane was named after the saint on whose day the disaster occurred, or it was named after the area that suffered the most from it. Sometimes the name was determined by the very form of development of the hurricane. So, for example, the hurricane "Pin" No. 4 got its name in 1935, the shape of the trajectory of which resembled the mentioned object. Known for the original method of naming hurricanes, invented by an Australian meteorologist. He used his official position for professional revenge on individual members of parliament who refused to vote for the allocation of loans for meteorological research, and called typhoons after them.
At first, only female names were used for names, later, when they were not enough, male names were used. The tradition originated in the early 1940s. At first, this was an unofficial terminology used by Air Force and US Navy meteorologists to facilitate the exchange of information about hurricanes found on weather maps - short female names helped to avoid confusion and shortened the text of radio and telegraph transmissions. Subsequently, the assignment of female names to hurricanes entered the system and was extended to other tropical cyclones - to Pacific typhoons, storms of the Indian Ocean, the Timor Sea and the northwest coast of Australia. I had to streamline the naming procedure itself. So, the first hurricane of the year began to be called a female name, starting with the first letter of the alphabet, the second - with the second, etc. The names were chosen short, easy to pronounce and easy to remember. For typhoons, there was a list of 84 female names. Since 1979, men's names have also been assigned to tropical cyclones.