Why and how are Storms like Storm Ashley named?

Storm Ashley was named by Met Éireann on Friday, October 18 becoming the first storm of the 2024/2025 season.

SO WHY AND HOW ARE STORMS NAMED?

Well, Met Éireann says storms are named when they could cause ‘medium’ or ‘high’ impacts in one of the three partner countries. It says this enables consistent, authoritative messaging to the public and other stakeholders to help them to prepare for and stay safe during potentially severe weather events.

Since 2015, Met Éireann and the UK Met Office have been working together on the naming programme and were joined by the Netherlands’ KNMI in 2019, to form the ‘western group’ of European weather services.

When a storm is forecast, Met Éireann says that the national weather service that expects the biggest impact from the severe weather to hit its region, or is likely to be first affected by it, names the storm. Storm naming happens in conjunction with orange/red weather warnings, which could be for wind, rain or snow, or a combination of these conditions.  Met Éireann says those warnings are, in turn, issued based on a combination of numerical thresholds and the potential impacts foreseen.

HOW ARE STORM NAMES CHOSEN? Answer BELOW PICTURE

Met Éireann, the UK Met Office and KNMI publish a new list of storm names for each Storm Season, which commences on 1st September.

Each of the three meteorological services contributed seven names to the 2024/25 season list. Met Éireann’s contributions to this year’s list were taken from more than 500 suggestions by primary school children participating in ESB Science Blast last February.

The full 2024/25 list is Ashley, Bert, Conall, Darragh, Éowyn, Floris, Gerben, Hugo, Izzy, James, Kayleigh, Lewis, Mavis, Naoise, Otje, Poppy, Rafi, Sayuri, Tilly, Vivienne, Wren. Met Éireann contributing the names for C, D, H, I, N, P and V (names chosen by Met Éireann in bold).

WHY AND HOW ARE STORMS NAMED?

Met Éireann says storms are named when they could cause ‘medium’ or ‘high’ impacts in one of the three partner countries. This enables consistent, authoritative messaging to the public and other stakeholders to help them to prepare for and stay safe during potentially severe weather events.

Since 2015, Met Éireann and the UK Met Office have been working together on the naming programme and were joined by the Netherlands’ KNMI in 2019, to form the ‘western group’ of European weather services.

When a storm is forecast, the national weather service that expects the biggest impact from the severe weather to hit its region, or is likely to be first affected by it, names the storm. Storm naming happens in conjunction with orange/red weather warnings, which could be for wind, rain or snow, or a combination of these conditions. Those warnings are, in turn, issued based on a combination of numerical thresholds and the potential impacts foreseen.

PAST STORM SEASONS OVERVIEW BELOW CHART

Last season (2023/24), Met Éireann says there were fourteen (14) named storms affecting the area, twelve (12) of which were named by the Western Europe Group, formed by UK Met Office, KNMI and Met Éireann, and the other two (2) storms (Elisa and Geraldine) by the Southwestern Europe Group, made up of France, Portugal and Spain.

2023/24 was the season with the highest number of storms named in a season by the Western Europe Group list (12 storms)
2023/24 is the first season since the initiative began in 2015 in which an ‘L’ storm was named from the list of the Western Europe Group – Storm Lilian in August 2024.

The lowest number of named storms since the initiative began was the four (4) named in 2022/23.

Prior to the 2023/24 season, the highest number of named storms occurred in the 2015/16 and 2017/18 seasons, with eleven (11) named storms in each.

Since 2015/16, there has been an average of eight (8) named storms in each season. 

Season 2015/2016 remains the season with the greatest number of storms reaching Storm Force 10, as nine (9) of the eleven (11) named storms observed Storm Force 10 sustained wind speeds at Atlantic coastal stations.

During the past season 2023/24, there were three (3) named storms with Storm Force 10 sustained wind speeds or higher:
Storm Force 10 sustained (10-minute mean) wind speeds were observed during named Storm Fergus (91 km/h) and Storm Jocelyn (96 km/h), at Mace Head (coastal), Co Galway on Sunday 10th December 2023 and Tuesday 23rd January 2024 respectively.

Violent Storm Force 11 sustained wind speeds were observed at Mace Head (coastal), Co Galway during Storm Isha on Sunday 21st January 2024. Before that, Violent Storm Force winds had been last observed during Storm Eunice on Friday 18th February 2022.

No Hurricane strength sustained/mean winds at any Met Éireann wind station have been observed since the Storm Naming initiative began. Storm Ellen in August 2020 came very close to observing winds of this strength, with 111 km/h at Roches Point, Co Cork. The last hurricane force winds affecting Ireland were observed during Storm Darwin on Wednesday 12th February 2014. Hurricane force winds have been observed at coastal western stations, mainly in January (half the time), twice in December and once in February, March and September.

It is not uncommon to have storms named in the month of October. Since the naming initiative started, 5 out of 9 seasons have had October storms, including Ophelia on 16th October 2017 and Babet last year. Prior to storm Ashley, a total of 7 storms have impacted Ireland in October, since 2015.

For more information on storm names and past storms, see Storm Centre and Major Weather Events