What’s in a name? As the 2010 hurricane season gets under way Tuesday, it depends on where in the world you are.

If you’re cowering behind shutters in South Florida, the first big blow will be called Alex, the ninth, Igor and so on, all the way to Walter.

But ours is not the only list.

The first storm off Mexico’s Pacific Coast will be Agatha.

The first off East Africa will be Onil.

Papua New Guinea is waiting to call its first monster wind Epi.

Each stormy region of the world, it turns out, has created its own set of names — a dozen or more in all — and registered them with the World Meteorological Organization.

The WMO sets the rules: Names must be culturally sensitive, noninflammatory and easy to understand for the locals.

Different regions even disagree on what to call such massive storms. We call them hurricanes along both coasts of the United States.

Japan and China call them typhoons.

Australians and Indians say tropical cyclones.

For decades, Atlantic hurricanes didn’t have names. They were just called “The Hurricane of 1926” and so on. In 1950, the National Hurricane Center tried military-style phonetic names — Able, Baker, Charlie. People were confused.

In 1953, the center started naming them after people — well, only after women as it turned out. Civility, or at least political correctness, set in by 1979, and the center started rotating names — male, female.

Names can come and go. Particularly deadly or damaging hurricane’s names are retired.

We won’t see Andrew, Wilma or Katrina again.

In the United States, we cannot get a hurricane named after us or a relative.

But, we might in Australia. However, it’s a laborious process that can take up to 50 years because new names are added only when older names are retired for having been used for particularly bad storms.

So your mother-in-law will probably be long gone before she gets your little comeuppance.

(Source: Maimi Herald)