December wind storm now dubbed the Hanukkah Eve storm

The powerful December windstorm that left a million customers without power and resulted in several deaths will be called the Hanukkah Eve Wind Storm of 2006, the National Weather Service announced this afternoon.

The storm happened on the day before the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah.

The name, submitted by Clyde Hill of Burien, was chosen from among 6,255 e-mailed entries. There were some 8,000 entries overall because some people offered more than one name.

Hill's entry was drawn from a group of 39 entries with the same suggested name.

In December, the Weather Service, struggling with what to call that month's big windstorm, asked the public to come up with a name.

Other storms have names: the Inauguration Day Storm in 1993, the Thanksgiving Day Storm of 1983 and the Columbus Day Storm of 1962.

Among the nominations were Typhoon Merry, Seattle Unplugged and the Evergreen Storm.

The December storm occurred during the Christmas season, and on a day of a big Seattle Seahawks game, so many of the nominations included holiday and football themes.

The storm cut off power to a million customers, some for a week or more, and caused millions of dollars in damages.

Fourteen deaths were attributed to the storm, including eight who died of carbon-monoxide poisoning.