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27 September 2023
UK Storm Names
At the start of September, the 2023-24 storm names were announced by The Met Office (UK National Weather Service), Met Éireann (The Irish National Meteorological Service) and The Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (MNMI) (Dutch National Weather Service).
The Met Office and Met Éireann began naming storms in September 2015, to raise public awareness and improve communications for the severity and threat of weather conditions. KNMI joined the naming group in 2019, extending the impact area to Netherlands.
Storm names are valid from the start of September (start of meteorological autumn) until the end of August (end of meteorological summer) the following year. During this period there is an increase in storm activity, as there is a greater temperature difference between cold and warm air masses. A name is issued when an intense low-pressure system is predicted to bring strong winds and heavy rain to the UK, Ireland, and the Netherlands. This coincides with an amber or red weather warning, where wind is predicted to cause severe damage to infrastructure, risk to life and disruption to travel. Potential disruption and damage from snow and risk of flooding from rain is also taken into consideration when naming storms.
Following the same pattern as the USA National Hurricane Center, the UK storm names are alphabetical and exclude letters “Q”, “U”, “X”, “Y” and “Z”, as there are fewer names starting with these letters. For 2023/24 the Met Office have also included “names of people who work to protect the public in times of severe weather” in the list.
During the storm season the UK can also experience storms from Europe and remnants of Atlantic hurricanes. These storms are not renamed, instead they keep their name issued at their origin. Atlantic Hurricanes will be referred to as ex-hurricane [name], for example “ex-hurricane Lee”. Storms named by other European groups will be known as storm [name from origin].
To stay safe and reduce the impact of storms, listen out for news alerts and updates when a new storm is named, and weather warnings are issued by the Met Office during the season.
