As we approach the beginning of the Atlantic hurricane season, you might be interested in a couple of news items. One is that the National Hurricane Center is debating whether they should start the season on May 15 instead of June 1 due to the number of early storms that have occurred in the past few years. They do plan to start issuing tropical advisories in mid-May but so far I don’t think they have officially changed the start of the season. You can read more here.
Another item of note is the that World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has retired four storm names, Dorian (2019), Laura, Eta and Iota (2020), from the rotating lists of Atlantic tropical cyclone names because of the death and destruction they caused in the years they occurred. In total, 93 names have been permanently retired from the list of active storms. In addition, they have decided not to continue the use of the Greek alphabet for storms beyond the usual alphabet, saying that it creates a distraction from the communication of hazard and storm warnings and is potentially confusing. Instead they have a reserve list of names that will be used if needed. You can read more at https://public.wmo.int/en/media/press-release/wmo-hurricane-committee-retires-tropical-cyclone-names-and-ends-use-of-greek?fbclid=IwAR0zaoRByGPKQ9QV-iPDJW84Lp36YLQtI5_H-OBY4Ai3OrnbWJ_f1mqhSMc.
