Naming hurricanes began hundreds of years ago. But only recently did they begin to be named after women.  It was during World War II that forecasters and meteorologists began using female names in identifying the storms. In 1953 the US weather service officially adopted the idea and created a new phonetic alphabet (international) of women's names from A to W.  Perhaps Women's Liberation in the 60's and 70's helped change the naming of storms to include male names in 1978.

Why name a hurricane? It's much easier and less confusing than trying to remember a storm by it's longitude and latitude.  It's also easier when you have more than one storm you are tracking. This is especially important in relaying messages between weather stations and ships or between ship to ship communications. Also, imagine your local weatherman being all tongue-tied with data. It's much easier for him or her to say "Hurricane Jane Reports" or even for historical weather records such as Hurricane Camille.

Because storms know no boundaries as far as geographical countries, the names have been given some international flair. Who picks the names?  They are agreed upon during the World Meteorological Organization by all the nations involved. How they come up with the names to vote on, I'm not sure. Do they nominate the names of their children, wives, girlfriends, relatives?  (If anyone knows please write me. I wrote them but they've never answered me.)  Names can be retired and replaced with another names in the event of severe storms. For example: You can have TS Jane (Tropical Storm Jane) that can turn into Hurricane Jane. There have been variations. For example:  Hurricane Mark and Hurricane Marc.

Do they run out of names? There are two lists. One for the Atlantic Ocean and one for the Eastern Pacific Ocean.  These lists are rotated year by year. As a result, names in 2001 will also be used in 2007. Now, the exception is the Central and Western Pacific Ocean. Those names are not rotated on a yearly basis.

The National Hurricane Center near Miami, Florida USA keeps an alert eye on all oceanic storms.  If winds are more than 39 miles per hour, it is officially a Tropical Storm and will be given a name. If it's under 39 miles per hour, well it's just a mighty big gusty wind. ;)

Will you be a Hurricane someday? If your name is one of the following below, you have already been one and your name is retired. Why are some hurricane names retired? For the hurricanes that are severe and cause a lot of property damage and/or loss of life, the name is retired because re-using it is felt to be insensitive to the victims. The name is then not used for at least ten years, or never again. 
As far as I know, none of the retired hurricane names below have been reused, even after ten years.  There can be, however, name variations. For example, in 2009 the name "Grace" is listed.  Yet below the retired name of "Gracie" is listed.  

Once a name is officially retired, it is then replaced with a name of the same gender and beginning with the same letter.  For example, Katrina could be replaced with Karen or Kate? But, Katrina will not be replaced with a male "K" name say like Karl. So far, since 1972, there have been 50 names that have been retired. And, since the names in the beginning of the alphabet get used more than those at the end, it's more likely that those will be retired names first.  So, if your name is towards the back of the alphabet (like my name of Sheila), the odds are you might not even get to be a hurricane name, let alone be a retired one. Below is a listing (as I know it today) of retired hurricane names. Since the storms were first named  beginning in 1953, they dropped two the next year. In 1954, were Carol and Hazel were the first hurricane retirees. For 2005, 5 names are now retired: Katrina, Dennis, Rita, Stan and Wilma.  This is the MOST retired names for a single year ever! Their replacement names are now on the 2005 list of hurricane names with after them.

Retired Hurricane Names
(I've attempted to be as updated and accurate as possible. If you know of a retired name I missed, please let me know.)

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 Names For Atlantic Storms Only!