Anatol is the name given by the German Weather Service

German Weather Service

The Deutscher Wetterdienst, , commonly abbreviated as DWD, , residing in Offenbach am Main, Germany, is a scientific agency that monitors weather and meteorological conditions over Germany and offers weather services for the general public as well as specific services for e.g. nautical, aviational...

 (the Danish service knew it as "Adam") to a powerful winter storm that hit Denmark

Denmark

Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...

, Southwest Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

, and Northern Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 on December 3, 1999. The storm had sustained winds of 146 km/h and wind gusts of up to 184 km/h, equivalent to an intense category 1 hurricane

Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale

The Saffir–Simpson Hurricane Scale , or the Saffir–Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale , classifies hurricanes — Western Hemisphere tropical cyclones that exceed the intensities of tropical depressions and tropical storms — into five categories distinguished by the intensities of their sustained winds...

, which is unusually strong for storms in northern Europe. The storm caused six fatalities and over 800 injuries in Denmark.

According to the Danish Meteorological Institute

Danish Meteorological Institute

The Danish Meteorological Institute is the official Danish meteorological institute, administrated by the Ministry of Transport and Energy. The institute makes weather forecasts and observations for Denmark, Greenland, and the Faroe Islands....

, the storm is estimated to have caused damage in Denmark of DKK

Danish krone

The krone is the official currency of the Kingdom of Denmark consisting of Denmark, the Faroe Islands and Greenland. It is subdivided into 100 øre...

 15 billion, or about USD

United States dollar

The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....

 3 billion. Storms causing damage of this magnitude are only expected every 500 years in Denmark.

The storm is referred to as a hurricane in Scandinavia

Scandinavia

Scandinavia is a cultural, historical and ethno-linguistic region in northern Europe that includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, characterized by their common ethno-cultural heritage and language. Modern Norway and Sweden proper are situated on the Scandinavian Peninsula,...

 and Germany even if it was, in fact, a European windstorm

European windstorm

A European windstorm is a severe cyclonic windstorm associated with areas of low atmospheric pressure that track across the North Atlantic towards northwestern Europe. They are most common in the winter months...

.

Meteorological history

A disturbance in the atmospheric circulation had began moving towards Europe. During the early evening of 2 December 1999, a closed cyclonic circulation was observed off the west coast of Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

. The next day, a ship reported a pressure of 990 hPa near the British Isles

British Isles

The British Isles are a group of islands off the northwest coast of continental Europe that include the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and over six thousand smaller isles. There are two sovereign states located on the islands: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and...

. Anatol reached its lowest pressure at 953 hPa near Jutland

Jutland

Jutland , historically also called Cimbria, is the name of the peninsula that juts out in Northern Europe toward the rest of Scandinavia, forming the mainland part of Denmark. It has the North Sea to its west, Kattegat and Skagerrak to its north, the Baltic Sea to its east, and the Danish–German...

 on December 3.

See also

• The 2005 storm Erwin
  Erwin (storm)
  Erwin was a powerful storm which hit Denmark and Sweden on 8 January 2005. The name Erwin was chosen by the German Weather Service, while the storm was named Gudrun by the Norwegian Meteorological Institute and was the name used in Sweden...
  
  
• The 2007 storm Per
  Per (storm)
  Per was the name of a powerful storm with hurricane winds which hit the west coast of Sweden and Norway on the morning of 14 January 2007. In Sweden six people died from the storm and approximately 300,000 households were left without electricity....
  
  
• European windstorm
  European windstorm
  A European windstorm is a severe cyclonic windstorm associated with areas of low atmospheric pressure that track across the North Atlantic towards northwestern Europe. They are most common in the winter months...
  
  

Sources

• Three extreme storms over Europe in December 1999 U. Ulbrich, A. H. Fink, M. Klawa and J. G. Pinto. Institut für Geophysik und Meteorologie der Universität zu Köln
  University of Cologne
  The University of Cologne is one of the oldest universities in Europe and, with over 44,000 students, one of the largest universities in Germany. The university is part of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, an association of Germany's leading research universities...
  
  .
• Windstorms in Denmark - from DMI (in Danish)