THE ONE-MINUTE GEOGRAPHER

Blizzards, Bombogenesis, Haboobs: The Fascinating History of Weather’s Most Dramatic Words

On the evolution of weather forecasting language—and how it escalates into rhetoric that captures our emotions

Hurricane Erin off of the East Coast of the US in August 2025. Photo by NOAA Satellites on noaa.gov here

Weather terminology and how it originates and evolves is quite fascinating. How this happens reminds us of the old journalism joke about how to grab headlines. It goes something like this:

A ‘bad news’ headline sells more newspapers than a ‘good news’ one. Even better is one that reads “Bad News to Continue.” But best of all is “Bad News to Get Worse.”

As newsprint dies off, the same principle applies to on-line reading. The world wants our clicks, and the outcome is an escalation of language to draw us in with the scariest and most ominous-sounding wording that writers can come up with. As we peruse the day’s headlines, we increasingly see, on a daily basis, how we are expected to be shocked, outraged, and stunned at the chaos, turmoil, disasters, crises, and emergencies, all of which are frightening, amazing, and alarming.