One of the more unexpectedly lovely neighborhoods of Wikipedia is the “list of local winds”: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_l…
Join me for a brief thread, won’t you
Join me for a brief thread, won’t you
Some winds are named for their supposed beneficial properties: Western Australia has the “Fremantle Doctor,” South Africa has the “Cape Doctor,” and the Cape Verde Harmattan wind is sometimes called “The Doctor.”
Autumn storm winds over the Great Lakes are called the “November Witch,” very metal: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_of_…
Western Mexico has the “Lash of St. Francis,” seasonal hurricane winds that are said to peak around the Feast of St. Francis in October: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cordonazo…
Southern Cuba’s Bayamo wind has a beautifully concise 1-2 punch of an article. 
Australia has “Brickfielders,” which are sometimes followed by “Southerly Busters,” because of course they are: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southerly…
The warm Chinook winds blow down the Rockies into the plains. One day in 1972, they helped produce the record for most extreme temperature change: an increase of 103 °F in 24 hours, in Loma, MT: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinook_w…
* The Chinook name also supposedly means "snow eater" for its snow-melting properties but as best I can tell this is apocryphal
Western Nevada has the Washoe Zephyr, first made famous by a Mark Twain travelogue and very much sounds like it should be the name of an Amtrak route: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washoe_Ze…
Northern California has its own equivalent of the Santa Anas, the “Diablo winds,” though it seems this nickname didn’t catch on until after the 1991 Oakland Hills firestorm (also unclear how much it's really caught on): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diablo_wi…
Baja California has the Coromuel, a wind named after the 19th century pirate Samuel Cromwell: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coromuel
At least two seasonal winds are named for their duration: the Iranian Plateau has the Wind of 120 Days, and Egypt has the Khamaseen (“fifty”, for fifty days): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khamsin
Bedouin names for Shamal winds in the Persian Gulf include Al-Haffar (the driller), Barih Thorayya (morning star). and Al-Dabaran (the follower): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shamal_(w…
One recurring theme is that the Mediterranean is ground zero for famous historical winds. These articles are full of references to Mediterranean wind cameos in the classics, religious texts, ancient warfare, etc.
Exhibit B: the article on “Classical compass winds,” which dives deep into the history of the naming and usage of different directional winds in early Western civilization. And by deep, I mean, uh, 10,000 words deep: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical…
The article on Provence's famous Mistral wind says that it causes the trees to grow bent to the south but I struggled to find real confirmation of this. whoa if true: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistral_(…
Not a shock but it's worth noting that the list feels like it skews heavily towards the Western world, I've gotta think that other cultures liked naming the wind as much as the Americans and Ancient Greeks but they don't get a lot of love here - further study is needed!
In conclusion if someone publishes an Atlas of Named Winds coffee table book I will very much buy it
