With hurricane season about three months away, here are the hurricane names for the potential storms in 2023.
The National Hurricane Center will release its official outlook on the upcoming season in May while Colorado State University will release its first season outlook in early April.
The 2022 season was somewhat of an active year, with a total of 14 named storms, including 8 hurricanes and 2 major hurricanes. Three of these storms hit the U.S. coastline, with Ian, Fiona and Nicole.
Here is the list of 21 names for the 2023 season:
Arlene
Bret
Cindy
Don
Emily
Franklin
Gert
Harold
Idalia
Jose
Katia
Lee
Margot
Nigel
Ophelia
Philippe
Rina
Sean
Tammy
Vince
Whitney
The list of hurricane names is determined by the United Nations World Meteorological Organization. The NHC uses six lists in rotation and they are recycled every six years, so 2023’s list should show up again in 2029, unless that formula is deviated from, for any reason..
A long time ago, hurricanes were named randomly. The military, for example, started naming storms after their girlfriends and wives, but none of these choices were made public.
Then, the National Weather Service decided to give human names to hurricanes to quickly identify storms and make it easier for citizens and media to process warning messages.
They used the World War II Alphabet – Able, Baker, Charlie, Dog, Easy – but this created confusion because every year the storm names were the same.
A few years later, in 1953, US weather professionals started using female names, sorted alphabetically. In 1979, they began alternating the feminine designations with male names, recycling the list every six years.
Names of especially destructive hurricanes are usually retired with the offending name replaced by another name. Recently, the names Otto and Matthew were retired after causing extensive damage back in 2016.
Let’s hope that no hurricane names get retired in 2023, and that Harold, Gert, Whitney and the rest of the gang aren’t planning to visit the Lowcountry this year.
Visit the NOAA for more hurricane information.
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