Whipping up a storm with an Irish name

IT won’t help with the clean-up but storms that batter the country in future could have an Irish twang.

Met Éireann is teaming up with the Met Office in Britain to officially name storms.

At present, there is no system for naming storms that hit Ireland but a pilot project this autumn and winter will see storms receive official names for the first time. The two forecasters are asking the public for suggestions for an A-Z list of storm names to be used for the next three years.

It is hoped that by naming the storms, it will raise awareness of incoming severe weather. Met Éireann’s John Eagleton told the Irish Daily Mail that Ireland should have an equal say in how storms are named. ‘If we are going to name them, we shouldn’t just let the British name them We should have a Storm Séamus,’ he said.

But the meteorologist said it can be difficult to track a storm, which will make naming them difficult and may not be ‘worth the hassle’. ‘Sometimes a storm is an entity that can be clearly identified and can be seen from a long way off, in the way that a hurricane can be tracked.

‘More often than not, they just blow up suddenly and you don’t get time to track them or name them.

‘But one thing is certain, we shouldn’t be bound by the [UK’s] naming of storms. We should have our own, like Storm Caitlín or Storm Mickey Joe.’

The forecaster was personally sceptical of the need to name storms, saying: ‘It can be more hassle than it’s worth. Let’s put it like this, if it’s a big wind coming along, we’ll tell them, we don’t need to name it.’

Suggested names can be tweeted to @ metoffice using #nameourstorms, or on the UK’s Met Office Facebook page or via email.

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