Hurricane names: how storms are named

How storms are named in each ocean

No single agency names every storm. The WMO has five regional tropical cyclone bodies, and each keeps its own lists: the RA IV Hurricane Committee, the ESCAP/WMO Typhoon Committee, the WMO/ESCAP Panel on Tropical Cyclones, the RA I Tropical Cyclone Committee and the RA V Tropical Cyclone Committee. The national weather services in each region propose the names, chosen to be short, easy to say and familiar to people there (Tropical cyclone naming).

• Atlantic, Caribbean and Gulf: the National Hurricane Center in Miami, from six lists of 21 names that alternate between men’s and women’s names and skip Q, U, X, Y and Z. See the current Atlantic hurricane names.
• Eastern Pacific, east of 140°W: also the National Hurricane Center, from six lists of 24 names that run all the way to Z. See the Pacific hurricane names.
• Central Pacific, 140°W to the Date Line: the Central Pacific Hurricane Center in Honolulu, from four lists of Hawaiian names used one after another. See the Central Pacific names.
• Western North Pacific: RSMC Tokyo gives a storm a name once it reaches tropical-storm strength, from a list adopted by the ESCAP/WMO Typhoon Committee. The names were contributed by 14 members and are used in sequence across years, so the first storm of a year simply takes the name after the last one of the year before (Western North Pacific and the South China Sea Names).
• Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea: RSMC New Delhi has named cyclones since September 2004, from names put forward by the Panel’s members, now 13 countries. A name there is used once and never repeated (Northern Indian Ocean Names).
• Australia: the Bureau of Meteorology’s warning centres share a single list, used in sequence since the 2008/09 season and restarted from the top when it runs out (Melbourne TCWC names).

The Atlantic started this way in 1953, when the United States began naming storms from lists of women’s names. Men’s names were added to the eastern Pacific lists in 1978 and to the Atlantic lists in 1979 (Tropical Cyclone Naming History and Retired Names).

What happens to unused names?

They wait for their list to come back. A season doesn’t carry its leftover names into the next year; the next year has a list of its own. NHC re-uses each of the six Atlantic and six eastern Pacific lists every six years, so the 2026 list returns in 2032 (Tropical Cyclone Names).

A worked example: the 2025 Atlantic season stopped at Melissa, the 13th name. Nestor, Olga, Pablo, Rebekah, Sebastien, Tanya, Van and Wendy were never used that year, and they wait until the list returns in 2031.

Late names are rarely reached. Of the 46 Atlantic seasons from 1980 to 2025, three used all 21 names (2005, 2020 and 2021), and only 11 got as far as the R name. In the eastern Pacific, the 24th name has been reached once, in 1992. So a name near the end of the alphabet can sit on a list for decades without a storm.

Retired hurricane names

A name is taken off the lists when a storm was so deadly or costly that using the name again would be insensitive. The WMO committee strikes it at its annual meeting and picks a replacement (Tropical Cyclone Naming History and Retired Names). NHC lists 100 retired Atlantic names since 1954 and 22 for the central and eastern Pacific since 1965.

• 2025: Melissa (Atlantic)
• 2024: Beryl, Helene and Milton (Atlantic); John (Pacific)
• 2023: Dora and Otis (Pacific)
• 2022: Fiona and Ian (Atlantic)
• 2021: Ida (Atlantic)

The most names retired from one Atlantic season is 5, after 2005: Dennis, Katrina, Rita, Stan and Wilma. More retired Atlantic names start with I than with any other letter: 14 of them. A replacement keeps the letter, so the list keeps its shape: Melissa’s place, after 2025, now belongs to Molly on the 2031 list. The full list follows; each name links to the storms that carried it.

Season of the storm that led to each retirement, per NHC. Names link to their storm-name page where our archive (1980 on) has one.

When the Greek alphabet was dropped

Twice, the Atlantic ran out of names. In 2005 (6 storms, Alpha to Zeta) and 2020 (9 storms, Alpha to Iota), storms after the 21st took letters of the Greek alphabet instead.

In March 2021 the WMO Hurricane Committee decided the Greek alphabet will not be used in future. It said the letters distracted from the warnings, were confusing when translated, and in 2020 produced storms with similar-sounding names (Zeta, Eta, Theta) at the same time. It retired Eta and Iota after the damage they did in Central America, and agreed a supplemental list of names to use instead (WMO Hurricane Committee retires tropical cyclone names and ends the use of Greek alphabet).

NHC now lists that supplemental list for the Atlantic (Adria, Braylen, Caridad, Deshawn …) and a separate one for the eastern Pacific (Aidan, Bruna, Carmelo, Daniella …) (Tropical Cyclone Naming History and Retired Names). No season since then has used up its regular list, so neither has been needed yet.