Why does Super Typhoon Dusurui have a name?

Typhoon Dusurui No. 5 in 2023 has had a huge impact on my country's southeastern coastal areas. When it landed in Jinjiang City, Fujian Province on July 28, the maximum wind force near the center of Dusurui was 15, reaching the level of a super typhoon.

In the past few days, the Central Meteorological Observatory has also issued several typhoon red warnings. At present, Dusurui has been downgraded to a severe tropical storm, but it is still moving northward and may cause extreme rainfall in provinces and cities along the way.

However, the name "Dusurui" seems to easily remind people of a little girl. Why did people give such a name to a super typhoon? This has to start with the naming of typhoons.

01
How are typhoons named?

First of all, I have to explain that a typhoon is actually a very powerful tropical cyclone. In a broad sense, we call tropical cyclones with a central wind force of 8 or above in the northwest Pacific and the South China Sea typhoons. In a narrow sense, only tropical cyclones with a central wind force of 12 to 13 in the above-mentioned areas are called typhoons (those occurring in the Atlantic and northeastern Pacific with a central wind force of 12 or above are generally called hurricanes).

However, in daily life, we may not strictly distinguish between the two words "typhoon" and "tropical cyclone". So in order to conform to everyone's habits, we will still use the term "typhoon" uniformly.

People have a special naming method for typhoons.

In the early to mid-20th century, the Japan Meteorological Agency would assign typhoons a four-digit number, with the first two digits representing the year and the last two digits representing the typhoon's sequence number.

Later, our country also adopted this method when naming typhoons. For example, on the website of the Central Meteorological Bureau, you can see that "Dusurui" is preceded by a four-digit number 2305, which means the fifth typhoon formed in 2023.

Image source: China National Meteorological Administration

How did the name of the typhoon change from a string of numbers to something like "Du Su Rui"?

From the mid-20th century until 1999, typhoons in the northwestern Pacific and South China Sea regions were informally named after people (initially all female names, but later male names were introduced) after the names given to them by the United States military.

At the 30th meeting of the World Meteorological Organization's Typhoon Committee in 1997, the Typhoon Committee decided that starting from 2000, typhoons formed in the northwest Pacific Ocean should be named in a more "Asian" way.

The 14 countries and regions that make up the Typhoon Committee each provide 10 names, and these 140 names form a typhoon naming table. After a typhoon is formed, it is named in the order of the naming table. In other words, the names of typhoons are determined before they are formed, and the typhoons themselves have no choice.

Information source: Central Meteorological Observatory "ESCAP/WMO Typhoon Committee Northwest Pacific and South China Sea Tropical Cyclone Naming Table Notes (to be implemented from 2022)", Map: Science Popularization China

These names are of course varied. For example, the 10 names proposed by mainland China are Anemone, Ginkgo, Wind God, Azalea, Mulan, Wukong, White Deer, Poseidon, Dianmu, and Begonia.
This time, the name "Du Su Rui" was provided by South Korea. Although it sounds like a little girl's name, it actually means "eagle" in Korean, and is pronounced "DOKSURI". No wonder "Du Su Rui" is so awesome.

The name after "Dusurui" is "Kanu", which is also currently forming and is expected to land in Zhejiang Province in early August.

Image source: Central Meteorological Observatory, China Weather

02
Will Typhoon also be fired?

Of course, the 140 names in the typhoon naming list are not fixed. In some cases, a typhoon will be removed from the list.

Most of the delistings were due to the serious damage and casualties caused by a typhoon. For example, Typhoon Rusa in 2002 caused economic losses of 4.2 billion US dollars in Japan, South Korea and North Korea, and 238 people died, so it was requested to be delisted. Typhoon Durian in 2006 caused more than a thousand deaths in the Philippines, Vietnam and Thailand, and it was also requested to be delisted.

After a typhoon is removed from the list, the country that originally named it can provide a new name to replace it.
Of course, in addition to causing serious disasters, there are also some other reasons for being asked to be removed from the list. For example, the name "Kudu" proposed by the United States was changed to "Aili" because its pronunciation is related to some obscene words in the Micronesian language of the western Pacific island country.

In addition, the Hong Kong Observatory believed at the 38th meeting of the Typhoon Committee that the two names "Xinxin" and "Tingting" proposed previously did not have Asian characteristics and applied to remove them. They were eventually replaced with "White Dolphin" and "Lion Rock". In 2014, Japan's "Sonamu" was also requested to be removed because it was pronounced similarly to "Tsunami".

Of course, no matter how gentle the name of a typhoon sounds, its power cannot be ignored.
In the next few days, the low-pressure circulation of "Dusurui" will be maintained for a long time, and will move northward to bring large-scale heavy rainfall to northern Jianghuai, Huanghuai, North China and even southern Northeast China, affecting more than 10 provinces including Jiangxi, Anhui, Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, etc. Among them, Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Henan and other places need to be alert to extreme rainfall.

During a typhoon, everyone should take precautions, close doors and windows, and minimize travel.

Typhoon Dusurui's path probability forecast for the next 12 hours (05:00 on July 29 - 17:00 on July 29), Image source: China Meteorological Administration

Finally, I would like to pay tribute to those who are still working during the typhoon.

Image source: China Meteorological Observatory

References International Meteorological Organization official website Author丨Science scraps Popular science team Review丨Xin Xin Senior Engineer of China Meteorological Administration