Aila, Amphan, Asani: What's in a cyclone's name?

According to the World Meteorological Organisation, there can be more than one cyclone at a time in a particular geographical location or around the globe

Every year, as a cyclone looms over a region, its name becomes a cause of intrigue for many, who wonder why and how the storm is christened.

With Cyclone Asani— a name given by Sri Lanka that means 'wrath' in Sinhalese— formed in the Bay of Bengal on Sunday morning and hurtling towards the east coast, the same question pops up again.

According to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), an agency under the United Nations, there can be more than one cyclone at a time in a particular geographical location or around the globe and the systems can last for a week or more.

Therefore, each tropical storm is given a name to avoid confusion, facilitating disaster risk awareness, management, and mitigation.

Short and easy-to-pronounce names are helpful in rapidly and effectively disseminating detailed storm information between hundreds of scattered stations, coastal bases and ships at sea.

It is less subject to error than the older and more cumbersome latitude-longitude identification methods.

Since 1953, Atlantic tropical storms have been named from lists prepared by the National Hurricane Center in the U.S.