By Carlos Tolentino Rosario
Two months before the hurricane season begins this year, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) already knows the list of names that will be used for cyclones that develop in the area of the tropical Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea or in the Gulf of Mexico.
The names, arranged alphabetically, cover only 21 letters of the alphabet and will identify that same number of low pressure systems that reach storm force. If the official list of names is exhausted, the agency will resort to an alternate list that was implemented last year and is used in each season, in case they are formed 21 cyclones or more.
The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) determined that the Greek alphabet will no longer be used to name storms or hurricanes due to the complexity that these names represented and because some of them have similar phonetics (they are pronounced almost the same), as was the case with Beta, Eta, Zeta, and Theta.
Now, the alternate list contains the names Adria, Braylen, Caridad, Deshawn, Emery, Foster, and so on. until ending with Will.
The official lists of names for tropical cyclones are six and alternate each year. On this occasion, the list that will cover 2022 will not be repeated until 2028.
Hurricane season names 2017
- Alex
- Bonnie
- Colin
- Danielle
- Earl
- Gaston
- Hermine
- Ian
- Julia
- Karl
- Lisa
- Martin
- Nicole
- Owen
- Paula
- Richard
- Tobias
- Virginie
- Walter
Fiona
Shary
“From 1953, Atlantic tropical storms have been nom bradas from lists originated by the National Hurricane Center. They are now maintained and updated by an international committee of the World Meteorological Organization. The original name lists included only female names. In 1979, men’s names were introduced and alternated with women’s names”, explains the WMO on its website.
The official lists of names are not altered or modified unless one of these is reminiscent of a cyclone that has caused deaths or serious economic losses in the territory that hit.
In the case of Puerto Rico, the names The most recent ones that were withdrawn due to the impact they had on the island were Irma and María, both used in 2017.