Who Knew Hurricanes Had A Gender? by: Irissa Kai written: 2016
Take a good look at these two photographs. Judging solely on what you see, which is more dangerous? Unless you’re a tsunami aficionado, you’d think these two hurricanes are equally devastating. Don’t get me wrong, they are devastating, but are they equally life-threatening? While Hurricane Igor is a Category 4, Sandy is a Category 3 hurricane. Igor, however, racked up a death toll of 4 victims while the latter had 234. That’s about 6 times more than the other! The question now is why was the death toll of a Category 4 hurricane smaller than a Category 3? On a larger scale, there have been 55 Atlantic hurricanes from the 1970s until the present. 28 were Category 5, out of which only 6 were given typical male names. This leaves the other 22 to have female names, leading us to believe that the majority (of male Category 4’s) garnered a higher death toll and hence, complied with the conducted research. A study conducted by researchers from the National Academy of Sciences revealed that "Feminine-named hurricanes (vs. masculine-named hurricanes) cause significantly more deaths, apparently because they lead to a lower perceived risk and consequently less preparedness.” (Jung et al, 2014: 8784). Simply put, people would be more scared of Igor than Sandy.