<P> During the 30th session of the ESCAP / WMO Typhoon Committee in November 1997, a proposal was put forward by Hong Kong to give Asian typhoons local names and to stop using the European and American names that had been used since 1945 . The committee's Training and Research Coordination Group was subsequently tasked to consult with members and work out the details of the scheme in order to present a list of names for approval at the 31st session . During August 1998, the group met and decided that each member of the committee would be invited to contribute ten names to the list and that five principles would be followed for the selection of names . It was also agreed that each name would have to be approved by each member and that a single objection would be enough to veto a name . A list of 140 names was subsequently drawn up and submitted to the Typhoon Committee's 32nd session, who after a lengthy discussion approved the list and decided to implement it on January 1, 2000 . It was also decided that the Japan Meteorological Agency would name the systems rather than the Joint Typhoon Warning Center . </P> <P> During its annual session in 2000, the WMO / ESCAP Panel on North Indian Tropical Cyclones agreed in principle to start assigning names to cyclonic storms that developed within the North Indian Ocean . As a result of this, the panel requested that each member country submit a list of ten names to a rapporteur by the end of 2000 . At the 2001 session, the rapporteur reported that of the eight countries involved, only India had refused to submit a list of names, as it had some reservations about assigning names to tropical cyclones . The panel then studied the names and felt that some of the names would not be appealing to the public or the media and thus requested that members submit new lists of names . During 2002 the rapporteur reported that there had been a poor response by member countries in resubmitting their lists of names . Over the next year, each country except India submitted a fresh list . By the 2004 session, India had still not submitted its list despite promising to do so . However, the rapporteur presented the lists of names that would be used with a gap left for India's names . The rapporteur also recommended that the naming lists be used on an experimental basis during the season, starting in May or June 2004 . The naming lists were then completed in May 2004, after India submitted their names . However, the lists were not used until September 2004, when the first tropical cyclone was named Onil by the India Meteorological Department (IMD). </P> <P> At the 22nd hurricane committee in 2000 it was decided that tropical cyclones that moved from the Atlantic to the Eastern Pacific basin and vice versa would no longer be renamed . Ahead of the 2000--01 season it was decided to start using male names, as well as female names for tropical cyclones developing in the South - West Indian Ocean . RSMC La Reunion subsequently proposed to the fifteenth session of the RA I Tropical Cyclone Committee for the South - West Indian Ocean during September 2001, that the basin adopt a single circular list of names . Along with the RA V Tropical Cyclone Committee, RSMC La Reunion also proposed to the session that a tropical cyclone have only one name during its lifetime . However, both of these proposals were rejected in favour of continuing an annual list of names and to rename systems when they moved across 90 ° E into the South - West Indian Ocean . During the 2002 Atlantic hurricane season the naming of subtropical cyclones restarted, with names assigned to systems from the main list of names drawn up for that year . </P> <P> During March 2004, a rare tropical cyclone developed within the Southern Atlantic, about 1,010 km (630 mi) to the east - southeast of Florianópolis in southern Brazil . As the system was threatening the Brazilian state of Santa Catarina, a newspaper used the headline "Furacão Catarina," which was presumed to mean "furacão (hurricane) threatening (Santa) Catarina (the state)". However, when the international press started monitoring the system, it was assumed that "Furacão Catarina" meant "Cyclone Catarina" and that it had been formally named in the usual way . During the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season the names pre-assigned for the North Atlantic basin were exhausted and as a result names from the Greek alphabet were used . There were subsequently a couple of attempts to get rid of the Greek names, as they are seen to be inconsistent with the standard naming convention used for tropical cyclones, and are generally unknown and confusing to the public . However, none of the attempts have succeeded and thus the Greek alphabet will be used should the lists ever be used up again . Ahead of the 2007 hurricane season, the Central Pacific Hurricane Center (CPHC) and the Hawaii State Civil Defense requested that the hurricane committee retire eleven names from the Eastern Pacific naming lists . However, the committee declined the request and noted that its criteria for the retirement of names was "well defined and very strict ." It was felt that while the systems may have had a significant impact on the Hawaiian Islands, none of the impacts were major enough to warrant the retirement of the names . It was also noted that the committee had previously not retired names for systems that had a greater impact than those that had been submitted . The CPHC also introduced a revised set of Hawaiian names for the Central Pacific, after they had worked with the University of Hawaii Hawaiian Studies Department to ensure the correct meaning and appropriate historical and cultural use of the names . </P>

When did hurricanes start being named male names