If there was ever a time to put sexist assumptions aside, you should probably do so when dealing with a hurricane.
In a recent study of the 47 most damaging hurricanes between 1950 and 2012, female-named storms were found to be the cause of death of 45 people on average, while equally aggressive male-named storms killed an average of 23 people.
To be clear, this doesn't appear to be because storms with feminine names mean they are "more wrathful" than ones with masculine names. Instead, researchers found that people don't consider a storm with a feminine name to be as risky and subsequently don't take the same safety precautions they would with storms with masculine names.
Study co-author Sharon Shavitt says, "People imagining a 'female' hurricane were not as willing to seek shelter. The stereotypes that underlie these judgments are subtle and not necessarily hostile toward women - they may involve viewing women as warmer and less aggressive than men."
Shavitt told the Washington Post that the results imply an "implicit sexism."
In response to the study, researchers note that they aren't necessarily suggesting a policy change surrounding the naming of hurricanes. But does this study show that sexism extends beyond humans and all the way into inanimate weather systems?
That choice, is up to interpretation.