Met Éireann rules out any ‘Storm Patrick’ because name is a ‘cliché’

THERE may be a national holiday named after him, but don’t bank on a Storm Patrick ever hitting our shores.

The popular Irish name has been ruled out of the running by Met Éireann as a potential storm name because it is “too clichéd”.

Met Éireann and the British Met Office announced a pilot project in September of this year to choose names for storms that may be blowing across our shores over the autumn and winter months.

Storm Clodagh hit last month and Patricia made the new list for the latest 2016-2017 batch of storm names, but Patrick was not so lucky and the name Phil made the cut instead.

In correspondence between the Irish and British weather services, seen by the Irish Independent as part of a Freedom of Information request, one top Irish weather man described the potential choice of Patrick as “a bit cliché Irish”.

“It is also closely associated with a specific date, March 17, so (I would) suggest Peter or Paul here?” read the correspondence.

The Met Office subsequently decided to change Patrick to the popular British name Phil - short for Philip or Philippa.

Meanwhile, Irish names Conor, Bridget, Oisin and Patricia have made the list for the 2016-2017 storm names compiled by Met Eireann and the British weather Office.

And it seems that certain names needed a little explaining with the names Oisin and Clodagh on the list accompanied by a phonetic explanation of how to pronounce the two names.

There was debate over what to name the first storm of 2015 but both parties agreed Abigail was a safe bet as it is “good to put the females out front”.

Other storm names include Barney, Lawrence, Wendy and Tegan.