Posted on 08/01/2003 8:50:07 PM PDT by Pikamax
Hurricane Latonya? Hurricane names raise a warning The 2003 hurricane season is here, and that means a whole new list of names such as Larry, Sam and Wanda ready to make tropical-storm history.
Although Spanish and French names are included in this year’s lineup, among them Juan and Claudette, which struck Texas last week, popular African American names, like Keisha, Jamal and Deshawn, are nowhere to be found.
Some black lawmakers don’t seem to mind, but Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) does. “All racial groups should be represented,” said Lee.
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The World Meteorological Organization began naming tropical storms after women in 1953. That made sense to scientists at the time who thought women and storms were both unpredictable. After feminist groups protested, men’s names were added in 1979.
The National Weather Service says hurricane names are derived from languages spoken in areas that border the Atlantic Ocean, where such storms occur. Yet that doesn’t explain why Gaston, Ernesto and Cindy were chosen and Antwon, Destiny and Latonya were passed over.
Lee said she hoped in the future the weather establishment “would try to be inclusive of African American names.”
That could take a while. The current roster of hurricane names isn’t due to be updated until 2007.
This is so shallow and inane that I should shut up myself! But this whole "African American names" is crap. It's just temporary fashion that means nothing. Practically none of blacks who are Americans have truly African names because their ancestors who actually spoke African languages are so long gone. The fact that Hurrican Sheila even publicly said this proves that she has she-it for brains.
GIVE
ME
A
*&$#^ing
BREAK.
What are those characters from Living Color (Wayans Bros) names? You know... the gay movie reviewers...
You know, hurricane Redskins is off the coast of Florida or Hurricane Titan in the Gulf.
Then when we run out of pro team names, we can use college teams. Hurricane Gators, Hurricane Seminoles, Hurricane Hurricanes.
My sister in law was a paramedic in the worst neighborhoods in Chicago some years ago... the stories she told were... so damn funny
In particular, she collected the names she encountered, and a few come to mind: A girl named Pepsi, a boy named Formica and a girl named Vagina.
My all time favorite was a girl named Female (pronounced Fem-olly).
The mother had some trouble with the forms after the birth and decided she liked the name.
Just wait a couple of years, they'll be rap stars on MTV...
Me too! It is such a friggin crutch for them.
*huff* *puff* On Behalf of all Americans, I'd like to protest the use of Arabic numerals to describe the All-American hurricanes that God blesses us with to strike our shores. Clearly, we need to use numbers that reflect our Western and Christian traditions back to antquity. I therefore recommend that we use Roman numerals to identify Hurricanes in the Western Hemisphere! :-D LOL!!!
For several hundred years, hurricanes in the West Indies were often named after the particular saint’s day on which the hurricane occurred. For example "Hurricane San Felipe" struck Puerto Rico on 13 September 1876. Another storm struck Puerto Rico on the same day in 1928, and this storm was named "Hurricane San Felipe the second". Later, latitude-longitude positions were used. However, experience has shown that using distinctive names in communications is quicker and less subject to error than the cumbersome latitude-longitude identification methods.
Using women’s names became the practice during World War II, following the use of a woman’s name for a storm in the 1941 novel "Storm" by George R. Stewart. In 1951 the United States adopted a confusing plan to name storms by a phonetic alphabet (Able, Baker, Charlie), and in 1953 the nation’s weather services returned to using female names. The practice of using female names exclusively ended in 1978 when names from both genders were used to designate storms in the eastern Pacific. A year later, male and female names were included in lists for the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. The name lists, which have been agreed upon at international meetings of the World Meteorological Organization, have an international flavor because hurricanes affect other nations and are tracked by the public and weather services of many countries.
The Tropical Prediction Center near Miami, FL keeps a constant watch on oceanic storm-breeding grounds. Once a system with counter-clockwise circulation and wind speeds of 39 mph or greater is identified, the Center gives the storm a name from the list for the current year. The letters Q, U, X, Y, and Z are not included because of the scarcity of names beginning with those letters. Names associated with storms that have caused significant death and/or damage are usually retired from the list.
Did you ever hear any of his "party" albums? Him and Moms Mabley. What shocked back then, is now all over HBO.
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