奇速英语

超强台风“摩羯”何以命名？台风命名的奥秘！

Super typhoon Yagi, the most powerful autumn typhoon to strike the Chinese mainland since the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, landed in South China’s Hainan province on Friday. The name Yagi has been used to name five tropical cyclones (气旋) in the northwestern Pacific Ocean. Japan submitted the name, which is the Japanese word for goat and the Japanese name of the constellation (星座) Capricornus. Hurricane or Typhoon? How tropical cyclones get their names?

The practice of naming storms has a long history. Before the 20th century, notable tropical cyclones were generally identified by the time when they occurred or the location where they struck. Thus, the hurricane that destroyed Galveston in 1900, killing 6,000 - 12,000 people, is remembered as the Great Galveston Hurricane.

The practice of giving storms personal names appears to have originated with Clement Wragge, an Australian meteorologist who in the 1890s entertained himself by naming storms after women, mythical figures, and politicians that he didn’t like. The modern system of using personal names developed during World War II, when meteorologists began using women’s names. Short and quickly understood, names were easier to transmit over the radio and easier to keep straight if there was more than one storm in a given area. The system was formalized in 1953. Male names were added to the list in 1979 when women’s groups pointed out the sexism of using only female names.

____△____ A special committee of the World Meteorological Organization maintains lists of names to be used for tropical cyclones. The names on the list must be short, distinctive, and relevant to their cultural and geographic areas. For the Atlantic basin there are six alphabetical (字母表的) lists of 21 names each, and the lists cycle yearly. If there are more than 21 named storms, Greek letters are used. For the Western Pacific/South China Sea basin, names on the lists are contributed by countries in the region. But if a hurricane or typhoon is especially destructive, that name is retired from the list.