Neodux - you rang?

With my hometown about to get pwn3d by Hurricane Rita, I was just thinking yesterday that R is getting close to the end of the alphabet that is used by the National Hurricane Center to name hurricanes and tropical storms. Over at LiveScience there is an article about what happens when we run out of hurricane names for a given season.

From the article I learned that the letters Q, U, X, Y, and Z are not used for selecting names, with no explanation of why. It is interesting to note that the most active storm season to date has produced 21 storms, which is exactly how many names are selected for use in a given season - and we're getting close to the threshhold.

Meanwhile, some are trying to make the tie between an active storm season and the hot weather. Some aren't buying it. Just yesterday AW had a football game and I can't remember the last time I felt that hot - it may have also been the fact that almost our entire team was playing both offense and defense, but I digress. Is it global warming? El Niño (which is spanish for 'the niño')? Or something more sinister?

update: Storm names still left on the list: Stan, Tammy, Vince, & Wilma.

Comments

Tim L. Sep 20, 2005 11:29

Corporations should be able to buy sponsorships and name the storms whatever they want. Hurricane Diet 7-up, etc. Of course, you would probably not want your product tied to something that could kill and destroy, so you could name it after your competition - Coke would name a hurricane Diet Pepsi!

Tommy G. Sep 20, 2005 11:53

unless, of course, Hurricane Diet Pepsi wipes out MinuteMaid Park. Then Coke would be in a world of hurt.

Bill S. Sep 20, 2005 12:13

But than again, if your Coke's hurricane destroyed a city the way Katrina has... you would be left with millions of "Coca Cola Benefits" all around the globe.

Tommy G. Sep 21, 2005 07:02

Weather.com has a link of how storms get their names.

Bill S. Sep 21, 2005 10:04

Stan is headed for Colorado.

Jeff G. Sep 21, 2005 13:14

baytown= pwnd!!!1!

Tommy G. Sep 21, 2005 21:32

pwn3d indeed. Let's hope it's not as bad as it has the potential to be. I guess we'll be able to look at this post in a few days and see where we stand.

Funny how years ago I loved hurricanes, but they were all puny Cat1 or Cat2 storms. This is the real deal. Here's for the best.

anonymous Sep 22, 2005 06:51

anonymous Sep 23, 2005 16:43

he must be from new orleans
+

Bill S. Sep 25, 2005 12:40

When I drove back from Corpus Christi... except for a couple leaves, branches, and torn up billboards... it looked like a hurricane had never even come threw.

Also, I heard that if they run out of letters this year, they are going to start using the Greek Alphabet.

Bill S. Sep 25, 2005 12:42

In Soviet Russia... Hurricane Names You!

Tommy G. Feb 09, 2006 22:41

It happened, we ran out of names. We even went so far as to have a Hurricane Gamma.