Tropical Storm Cindy

[Eric]

In my opinion, it would be beyond confusing, and needlessly so, to have both named and unnamed-but-numbered tropical systems, with both conventions being used simultaneously.  Imagine a category 5 hurricane, strongest ever on record, not being named simply because it's in the middle of the ocean and not impacting land.  Do you want something like that unnamed?  Or would distant tropical storms only be numbered, but an unnamed tropical storm would get a name if it becomes a hurricane, even if it's still in the middle of nowhere?

Too much confusion.

[phw115wvwx]

In my opinion, it would be beyond confusing, and needlessly so, to have both named and unnamed-but-numbered tropical systems, with both conventions being used simultaneously.  Imagine a category 5 hurricane, strongest ever on record, not being named simply because it's in the middle of the ocean and not impacting land.  Do you want something like that unnamed?  Or would distant tropical storms only be numbered, but an unnamed tropical storm would get a name if it becomes a hurricane, even if it's still in the middle of nowhere?

Too much confusion.

Hurricanes would automatically earn a name no matter what in my idea.  Yes, I was simply taking a step back to see if there's possibly a better way to handle everything and keep the false alarms low, but I see there's no clear answer.  So, our current system is probably the best we can do until someone comes up with a new idea.

Anyway, Cindy is still a tropical storm with winds of 60 mph at 5 PM EDT, but it'll become extratropical in about 24 hours.

[Mike M]

Cindy has dissipated.