Ireland's 2026 storm names announced mark 90th anniversary of Ireland's meteorological service

Met Éireann has released its list of storm names for the year ahead, drawing on the service's own 90-year history for some of its picks. The announcement, made in partnership with the UK's Met Office and the Netherlands' KNMI, kicks off a storm season that runs from September 1 through August 31, 2027.

The full list of 21 names includes Austen, Boelo, Chloe, Dano, Evelyn, Finn, Gwendolyn, Heather, Ivy, Jade, Kilian, Laoise, Miriam, Nicola, Olaf, Phelim, Ruban, Shaun, Theo, Vesna, and Wende, with each of the three meteorological services contributing seven names apiece. As with the US National Hurricane Center's system, the letters Q, U, X, Y, and Z are left out.

Met Éireann's own contributions carry special meaning this year. Four of its seven names, Austen, Evelyn, Kilian and Miriam, were chosen to reflect notable figures from the organization's past, while three others, Heather, Laoise and Phelim, were selected through a public nomination campaign held last year.

Among those honored are Austen Nagle, who served as the first director of the Irish Meteorological Service when it was founded in 1936, and Miriam Lyons, the first woman to hold an operational role as a meteorological officer at the service.

Eoin Sherlock, Head of Forecasting Division at Met Éireann, said naming storms plays a practical role in keeping people safe. He noted that giving storms names "allows us and other public safety organizations to increase awareness of severe and impactful weather alongside our weather warnings" and pointed to spikes in website and social media activity during storm events as proof that the system works.

Sherlock added that the anniversary made this year's list especially meaningful, saying it was a chance "to recognize some of the significant contributors to our history in the list of storm names this year."

Holly Clements, Head of Warnings and Guidance at the UK Met Office, echoed that sentiment, noting that storm naming has helped communicate weather risks "for more than a decade." She explained that a named storm "provides a clear focus for forecasts and warnings, helping more people understand the potential impacts and take action to protect themselves, their families and their property."

A storm earns a name when forecasters expect it to cause medium or high impacts in Ireland, the UK, or the Netherlands. Whichever national service anticipates the greatest impact or expects to be affected first gets to assign the name, and the other two countries then use that same name for consistency. The collaboration between Met Éireann and the UK Met Office began in 2015, with KNMI joining in 2019.

The system also applies to storms named elsewhere. Ex-hurricanes crossing the Atlantic from the US National Hurricane Center, such as Charley in 1986 and Ophelia in 2017, kept their original names when they battered Ireland's coastline.