The Weather

[Barnard]

Further to Katharine’s idea, when we get to the letter ‘S’, we could name the storm after Mrs Stick’s dog and have storm Stinker.

[Katharine]

Hopefully we won't get that many storms though!

[Fiona1986]

There was a hurricane Frederic in 1979! I knew that storms were alphabetical and alternating male and female, but I didn't realise we had only been naming them since 2015, while the Americans have been at it since 1953.

[Jomo]

There’s a list of names for cyclones which is coordinated and updated by an international committee of by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Each region maintains their own list and if a storm is particularly severe, they retire that name so it can’t be used again anywhere. An informal system of naming storms has been in place since the early 1900’s, but since 1953, the Atlantic region’s storms have been named from lists maintained by the National Hurricane Center USA.
Up until fairly recently all cyclones/hurricanes had female names, I think that changed after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Women must have got sick of taking the blame and shame.
Australia has been formally naming cyclones since 1970, but the one we all remember is tropical Cyclone Tracy which destroyed the town of Darwin on Christmas Day 1974. I had friends in Darwin with 2 small children, they sheltered in a downstairs laundry and bathroom which was built of concrete blocks. When they emerged after the cyclone they found that the entire house had been ripped away, as had all their neighbours houses. Their daughter was almost two at the time, she would not go into a bathroom for years afterwards, they just had to hose her down outside, good thing they were living in the tropics!

[pete9012S]

..when we get to the letter ‘S’, we could name the storm after Mrs Stick’s dog and have storm Stinker.

Oh Barnard, that did make me laugh!

[Boatbuilder]

That's a great suggestion.

Maybe next year when they decide on names for storms for 2023 they could all be taken from Enid's stories?

Would that really be good idea? I don’t think many people like theses storms so why associate what we don’t like with Enid’s lovable characters.

[Katharine]

Good point, Enid doesn't need any extra negative press!

[Barnard]

I still think it is a good idea. It is only a bit of fun and the only people who know about it will be people who are already Blyton fans.

[Katharine]

Maybe we could compromise and choose names of Enid's villains.

I can't think of one beginning with A, but B could be 'Block'.

[Barnard]

You’re right again, Katharine. Villains and Villainesses is a good idea.

[Boatbuilder]

That would be OK, so how about trying to find as many as possible - remembering they have to be alternative genders in alphabetical order. So we need a female A to start with if Block is to be one.

[pete9012S]

I still think it is a good idea. It is only a bit of fun and the only people who know about it will be people who are already Blyton fans.

Hear Hear!

[timv]

Snow flurries in Lymington as well as a sharp Easterly wind at lunchtime today - though the snow was not settling for more than a few minutes. Whereas yesterday determined bird-watchers on the seawall at Keyhaven were in shorts and there were a couple of people swimming in the sea at Milford. Mixed up with early-flowering shrubs in the more sheltered parks, sunshine when the wind drops, and the lapwings and avocets back for the spring - two different sorts of climates within a few minutes.

[Boodi 2]

It is the same here in Germany! After a week of sunshine and very mild weather (temperatures of around +16 degrees) it has now become chilly again and snow is forecast. The weather is really mixed up at the moment and hopefully the cold snap won't harm the trees and early-flowering plants.

[Katharine]

As the weather has been mentioned elsewhere, I thought I'd hunt out this thread.

Yesterday afternoon I had to drop my daughter somewhere for about an hour. I was then going to pop back home to do a couple of things before picking her up again, it's not too far to drive, so I usually have somewhere between 20 and 30 minutes at home. I knew heavy rain was forecast, and as I walked back to my car I could see the sky looking rather ominous, but it was still dry. However, as I glanced down the road, I could see what appeared to be a grey curtain, slowly heading towards me.

Cars coming from that direction had their lights on and wind screen wipers going. Within less than a minute of getting into my car, the rain had reached me. Although fairly heavy, it wasn't too bad driving along the road, but by the time I'd turned onto another road a couple of minutes later, the conditions were horrendous.

The rain was so heavy that visibility was very poor. Although I was going fairly slowly, I was throwing up spray at the side of the road that was as high as my car. I'm hoping I didn't drench anyone - I don't think there were any pedestrians about. After a minute or two of this I was getting quite anxious, I'm not the most confident of drivers at the best of times, so thought it would be best if I pulled over somewhere until the rain had at least eased a bit.

Fortunately my sister lives quite close to where I was at that point, so I turned into her road and pulled up outside her house. The rain was still so heavy that I thought I'd get soaked, even in a rain coat just running up to her front door, so think I sat and read a magazine for a good 10 minutes or more before I considered venturing out of the car. Then, just as the rain had almost eased, there were a couple of really loud cracks of thunder - so I stayed put for a bit longer! Eventually it stopped and I went and rang her bell - there really wasn't time for me to finish driving home and then turning out again.

By the time I fetched my daughter, the sun was out and only the puddles by the sides of the road gave any hint of the deluge we'd just had. When I went out to feed my guinea pigs last night, I had to move a tray to get to one of the cages - I reckon there was easily an inch of water in it!