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Topics: News, Weather, World News
Rhianna Benson
As Hurricane Melissa continues to wreak devastation across Jamaica, questions have been raised by onlookers over the naming of the storm.
After winds began picking up in the Caribbean on Monday evening (27 Oct), experts initially considered the natural disaster to be a Category 5 storm, unaware that extreme weather would quickly intensify to a deadly degree.
Now, experts believe that Melissa has become the strongest storm that planet Earth has seen this year so far, likely to inflict a death toll that could challenge the 408-500 lives lost in the Florida Keys following the harrowing 1935 Labor Day Hurricane.
Already, the storm taken the lives of four individuals across both Haiti and the Dominican Republic, and is currently tearing its way through Jamaica, racking up wind speeds of up to 175mph (282km/h).
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Many onlookers around the world have also found themselves invested in the name of the hurricane, with some questioning how exactly Melissa was named as such.
"I just want to know who named it Hurricane Melissa, who said it was a woman and why did they go with that name?…" one X user questioned.
Another noted: "Can't explain why but Melissa is a terrible name for a hurricane."
"These M name storms in the Caribbean have been horrific the last decade," a third also wrote.
According to the Met Office, hurricanes and cyclones are given specific names in order to streamline communication between scientists in the field and the public, given that some countries are more partial to extreme weather than others.
As far back as World War II, and in almost every country around the world, this system is alphabetical. This means that an 'A' name being given to the first major storm of the year, and a 'B' name given to the second, and so on and so forth.
As reported by CBS, there are six alphabetical lists of 26 names that are rotated every six years. As such, the names that are chosen for this year's natural disasters will roll back around in 2031.
Following the deaths of three more citizens, residents of Jamaica have been warned to brace themselves, with top meteorologist Dylan Federico predicting lengthy blackouts across the country, as well as nationwide collapses in communication, and the cutting off of entire communities.
"Winds in the mountains will exceed 200 mph. Trees will be completely deforested and debarked," he wrote on Facebook. "Infrastructure exposed to the winds will be completely destroyed.
"Heavy flooding rain and mudslides will wash away roads, isolating communities for long periods of time. On the coast, life-threatening storm surges will cause additional destruction."