A few years ago, the Weather Channel decided it should be naming winter storms affecting the United States in the same way international government agencies name tropical systems. However, the criteria they use are not as precise as theirs. Tropical systems are named based on location where they are formed, once they have achieved a minimum sustained wind speed. The Weather Channel, a corporate division of NBC/Universal and now Comcast, uses the approximate total accumulation of wintry precipitation (snow, sleet, and/or freezing rain) and total population to be affected as their criteria. This means that a relatively minor nuisance in a highly populated area, such as the Mid-Atlantic, could get a named storm, while a almost blizzard might be ignored in a low population area, such as the northern Great Plains. A corporate entity should not have the power of deciding whether a weather event should be considered "major" or not. It place too much importance on people as opposed to the weather itself. Furthermore, the way it decides upon name is also somewhat skewed. When it first started out, the Weather Channel had weather students pick out the names, mostly from Latin and fiction. This season's names are more pedestrian and commonplace. Mostly, they are forgettable. The most recent ones are still fresh, though, as they were all nor'easters, following similar paths. In order, they were "Riley", "Quinn", and "Skylar." (Quinn was first named when it hit the west coast, and kept the name as it crossed the country, before striking New England.) Now, the latest storm is called "Toby." While it is slowly becoming a more popular name, at least three television series airing on Tuesday nights have characters named Toby or Tobias, the act does seem to be cross-promotional, as one of these series airs on NBC. If timing had been better, this particular storm would have struck while the show was still airing new episodes, making a great promotional theme for the company. As it is, this current storm is slow in churning out bad weather. Because it is late March and already spring, much of the impact of this storm will fade quickly, with many areas having even three to five plus inches of snow melting fairly quickly. In fact, done of these four storms have impacted myself personally, at least in any great degree. Yes, it is forecast to produce some areas with thundersnow, the unique blend of blizzard and thunderstorm that drives some weather geeks wild. It seems to drive viral video content, but it isn't as special as it once was before more people realized its special nature. At least I will have s storm named after me. T is too far into the alphabet to hope to have a tropical storm with my name, and more likely to be negative as well.
