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The next tropical storm that develops in the Atlantic this hurricane season will be named Dolly, but the timing is pure coincidence and has no connection to country music star Dolly Parton’s death on Tuesday.
Storm systems are named by procedures set by the World Meteorological Organisation and the lists of names are reused every six years. For the Atlantic region, the lists are alphabetical and alternate between male and female names.
This season started with Tropical Storm Arthur coming ashore on the US Gulf Coast in June, and Tropical Storm Bertha dumped rain in Louisiana and Texas in July.
Tropical Storm Cristobal formed and quickly dissipated in the Atlantic earlier in August.
The National Hurricane Centre was monitoring a weather system off Africa that may strengthen into a named tropical storm.
Conditions were favourable for the area of thunderstorms south of the Cabo Verde Islands to become a tropical depression sometime in the next week, forecasters at the Miami-based centre said on Tuesday evening.
If it further develops, with maximum sustained winds of at least 63 kph, the system would be named Tropical Storm Dolly.
Forecasters said another weather system in the Atlantic far northeast of Bermuda was disorganized Tuesday and had a poor chance of further development.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has forecast a below-average Atlantic hurricane season due to the El Niño climate phenomenon.
It forecast eight to 14 named storms, with three to six of them reaching hurricane strength and one to three of those intensifying to major hurricanes.
The NHC and other weather agencies name storms to easily communicate warnings about them to people and to avoid confusion. The WMO says names are chosen to be short, easy to pronounce and familiar to the regions of the world where the storm names are used.
It meets regularly to evaluate potential names, and some names are retired for reasons of sensitivity, particularly for deadly or destructive storms.
Country music star Dolly Parton died on Tuesday at the age of 80 after “bravely facing a brief battle with cancer,” her team said.
Additional sources • AP