第1408期:Run for cover - Abigail is coming!

Go home and shut all the windows because Abigail is coming! In this case, Abigail is not a very angry lady, but the name of a storm chosen by the public in an initiative by the UK weather service, the Met Office, and its Irish counterpart Met Eireann.回家关上所有的窗户，因为阿比盖尔要来了！在这种情况下，阿比盖尔不是一位非常愤怒的女士，而是公众在英国气象局、英国气象局及其爱尔兰同行 Met Eireann 的一项倡议中选择的风暴名称。

In the last few months they have compiled a list of names suggested by ordinary people. 在过去的几个月里，他们编制了一份普通人建议的名字清单。

In alphabetical order, Barney is next, followed by Clodagh.按字母顺序，Barney 紧随其后，Clodagh 紧随其后。 

You might find Katie down the line, and also Nigel.你可能会找到凯蒂，还有奈杰尔。

The idea of giving peoples' names to storms is to make people more aware that bad weather is on its way – and it is more understandable than giving them the latitude and longitude.给暴风雨命名的想法是让人们更加意识到恶劣的天气即将来临——这比给他们提供纬度和经度更容易理解。

 Following a convention by the US, no storms will be given names beginning with the less common letters: Q, U, X, Y and Z.按照美国的惯例，不会给风暴命名以不太常见的字母开头：Q、U、X、Y 和 Z。

The National Hurricane Center in Miami has officially been naming the Atlantic's tropical cyclones since 1953 – men's names were included in the 1970s. 自 1953 年以来，迈阿密的国家飓风中心正式命名大西洋的热带气旋——男性的名字在 1970 年代被包括在内。

But the list is maintained and updated by the World Meteorological Organization, a UN agency based in Geneva.但该名单由设在日内瓦的联合国机构世界气象组织维护和更新。

Names of storms considered too catastrophic are 'retired' and replaced. 被认为过于灾难性的风暴名称将被“退休”并替换。

No more Katrina – the name of the devastating hurricane that killed nearly 2,000 in the US in 2005. 不再有卡特里娜飓风——2005 年在美国造成近 2,000 人死亡的毁灭性飓风的名称。

Cyclones are upgraded to hurricanes if they reach 119km/h.如果达到 119 公里/小时，旋风将升级为飓风。

But what happens when there are too many storms in the world in a particular year? 但是，当世界上某一年的风暴太多时会发生什么？

Julian Heming, tropical predictions scientist at the Met Office in the UK, explains: "If the remainder of the season is very active, it's not out of the question we'll have to... start using letters from the Greek alphabet."英国气象局的热带预测科学家 Julian Heming 解释说：“如果这个季节的剩余时间非常活跃，我们将不得不……开始使用希腊字母表中的字母。”

词汇

表

storm  暴风雨
weather service  天气服务机构（此处指英国气象中心）
to compile  编辑，编纂
alphabetical order  按照英文字母表顺序
latitude  纬度
longitude  经度
convention  常规，习惯，规定
hurricane  飓风
tropical  热带的
cyclone  龙卷风，气旋
meteorological  气象的，气象学的
catastrophic  毁灭性的
upgraded  被提高、升级
season  季节