The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) announced on Wednesday, March 20, that the names for Hurricane Otis and Hurricane Dora will be retired this year, both Eastern Pacific tropical storms.
As AccuWeather reports, the decision to retire a name is made by the WMO Tropical Cyclone Committees. A name is retired if a storm is so deadly or costly using the same name for another storm would be insensitive. Retired names aren’t used for at least a decade, which preserves historic references, insurance claims and other legal actions.
No Atlantic hurricane names will be retired for the first season in 10 years. This is unusual for several reasons, AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Dan Pydynowski says. “More storms are retired in the Atlantic than the Eastern Pacific because storms are more likely to hit land, especially populated areas,” Pydynowski explained. Before last season, 19 East Pacific and 96 Atlantic had been retired. Retiring two East Pacific storms from one year is also unusual. The only other year where that happened was 1997.
The name Otis will be stricken from the North Pacific basin’s list due to the death and destruction it caused in Acapulco, Mexico, last October. Otis will be replaced by Otilio in the next run of the first group of six lists of storm names, which will be in 2029.
Otis quickly strengthened into a Category 5 hurricane, the most powerful storm ever measured at landfall in the East Pacific, before slamming ashore in Acapulco. It caused some of the worst damage ever recorded in a major city. The storm may have killed as many as 350 people although the official government death toll remains at 52. Hurricane Otis caused $12 to $16 billion in damage, by far the most expensive ever recorded in the East Pacific basin.
Hurricane Dora, which indirectly contributed to the devastation caused by the wildfires in Maui, Hawaii, in August, will also be removed from the list and replaced with Debora. Dora was a long-tracked hurricane as it moved from the Eastern Pacific into the Central Pacific and finally crossed the international date line, becoming a typhoon, one of only two storms ever to accomplish that feat.
This is the second ocean basin in which Dora has been retired, as that name was removed from the Atlantic basin’s name list in 1964. Dora will be replaced by Debora in 2029. “The work of the Hurricane Committee is critical to ensuring that everyone in the region across the Atlantic and east Pacific basins is ready for the upcoming 2024 hurricane season and reducing the impacts to life and property from these dangerous storms,” said Dr Michael Brennan, Director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
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