A sheep on the storm list: the 2026/27 names land 1 September — and the public picked one

The current storm-name list retires at the end of August, and its replacement arrives on Tuesday 1 September — with a first. One of the 2026/27 names was put to a public vote, and both candidates were sheep.

Shaun vs Timmy

To mark Aardman's 50th anniversary (and the 18 September release of Shaun the Sheep: The Beast of Mossy Bottom), the Met Office ran a public vote across its X, Instagram, WhatsApp and YouTube channels from 19–21 August: should the storm list carry Shaun or Timmy? The winning character joins the official 2026/27 list, which the Met Office publishes jointly with Met Éireann and KNMI — the Irish and Dutch national weather services — on 1 September.

Aardman cast Shaun as a sustainability ambassador; the Met Office's angle is more practical. As Holly Clements, the Met Office's Head of Warnings and Guidance, put it: "Naming storms helps our weather warnings reach more people".

Why storms get named at all

• A storm is named when it's forecast to bring medium or high impacts to the UK, Ireland or the Netherlands — broadly, when an amber or red warning is in play.
• The three met services share a single list, so a system gets one name whichever country it hits first.
• Names run alphabetically through the season (1 September to 31 August), skipping Q, U, X, Y and Z in line with the US hurricane-naming convention.
• Ex-hurricanes keep their Atlantic names — which is why a name from outside the list can appear mid-season.

What it means for chasers

The first named storm of the autumn will carry the new list's A-name, and every event recap and report thread here from the first October gale onward will hang off this list. We'll publish the full 2026/27 line-up on 1 September, the moment it drops — including whether Britain's first sheep-named storm ends up being Shaun or Timmy.

A name doesn't change the meteorology — it's a warning-communication device, not a category. Treat the name as a signpost to the warnings, and read the warnings.

Sources: [Met Office — Public invited to choose future storm name](https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/news-and-media/media-centre/corporate-news/2026/public-invited-to-choose-future-storm-name-as-met-office-links-up-with-aardman-); [Aardman announcement](https://www.aardman.com/latest-news/2026/august/public-invited-to-choose-future-storm-name-as-met-office-links-up-with-aardman/).