Who chooses the names of storms and hurricanes ..? A question that resonates among millions of people who follow the weather, storms and cyclones in the region, including tropical cyclone Maha, currently active in the Gulf of Oman, and before it cyclone Kiar, which had some indirect effects on the east coast of the country.
Emirates Today sought an answer to this question through the National Meteorological Center. Majid Nasser, a member of the Northern Indian Ocean, Sea of Oman and Gulf of Bengal Storm and Cyclone Names Committee, said: “The names of storms and cyclones are not chosen randomly or locally. There is a committee on launching these names, which was previously composed of eight countries in the North Indian Ocean. The UAE and four other countries joined it last year, bringing its membership to 13 countries.
Nasser added: «Each year, each member of the Committee, choose a name for a storm, and all names are placed in a list similar to the periodic table, so that each name is used in alphabetical order of the member countries of the Committee, and when any tropical storm is named after the order Names in the pre-prepared table », stressing that it is not required that the name of the storm is chosen by the countries that pass through or affected by them.
Regarding the rules and mechanisms for selecting storm names, Nasser said: “Initially, no storm in the North Indian Ocean, the Sea of Oman or the Bay of Bengal will be called, except when it becomes tropical, according to the resulting wind speeds. The names already listed on the list by the Committee in descending order (from top to bottom). Each member of the Committee is assigned to choose a name for a storm, provided that the name is easy to pronounce and does not have any political, religious, racial or racial meaning or use, The full names will then be submitted to the Committee for consideration and adoption, for elaboration The ready-to-use list in order. »
“Given the region's most recent tropical storm, Maha, which has evolved into a second-degree tropical cyclone, it was Oman that chose this name, according to its role in the name selection table. Days ago it was Myanmar that chose this name, as well as Typhoon Hika was named by the Maldives, and also Cyclone Vaio was the name of the State of India ».