The British weather service, the Met Office, together with sister organizations in, for example, Ireland, gives names to strong low-pressure systems that risk having a major impact on society.
For over a decade, the public has been able to help with the naming by submitting suggestions. In the case of “Dave,” a woman wanted to honor her husband and justified the suggestion by saying that her husband could “snore three times louder than any storm.” This was confirmed by the Met Office to TV4 Nyheterna.
New common list of names for storms
Since January 1, 2026, storms have common names in Sweden, Norway and Denmark. The list of names has been drawn by lottery and consists of personal names that have not been used before and are easy to pronounce in the three countries. When the list is exhausted, a new one is drawn because the same name cannot be used for a storm more than once.
Here are the new common names: Anna, Björn, Cecilia, Daniel, Elena, Filip, Gunilla, Hugo, Ida, Johan, Karin, Lukas, Miriam, Noah, Olivia, Pelle, Ronja, Sture, Tonje, Urban, Vilma and Ymer.
If a storm has already been named by another country's weather service, Sweden "inherits" that name. That's why the storm "Dave" continues to be called that.
Source: SMHI
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