What’s in a name?

Atlantic hurricanes in the Caribbean have been getting names for hundreds of years, but the United States government didn’t start handing out names until the 1950s. Using easily remembered names reduces confusion if there happen to be more than one storm occurring at the same time. A storm with a name is easier to remember than a storm with a date or a storm with a location.

For centuries Caribbean hurricanes were named after the particular saint’s day that the hurricane occurred. The United States Weather Bureau started naming hurricanes in 1950, but for the first two years, they used the phonetic alphabet. In 1953, the weather bureau started using female names for storms. In 1979 men’s names were added to the list, with each storm alternating between and male and a female name and this practice continues today.

The list of names comes from the World Meteorological Organization. There are actually six lists that are used in rotation, so the names we are using this year will be repeated again in 2014. If a storm is particularly deadly or costly, it will be retired from the list, and a new name with that starts with the same letter will be substituted. Since 1954, 70 names have been retired. Hurricane Hazel was the second name retired.

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