Laura, Dorian, Entire Greek Alphabet Retired Following 2019, 2020 Atlantic Hurricane Seasons

 Jonathan Erdman

Published: March 17, 2021

Laura and Dorian were such destructive hurricanes over the past two hurricane seasons that they will no longer be used to name future Atlantic tropical storms or hurricanes.

The decision to retire 2020's Hurricane Laura and 2019's Hurricane Dorian was made during an annual meeting held online this week by the World Meteorological Organization's (WMO) hurricane committee. The Greek alphabet has also been retired for naming storms as part of the announcement.

Atlantic tropical cyclone name lists repeat every six years unless a storm is so severe that the WMO hurricane committee votes to retire that name from future lists. This avoids the use of, say, Harvey, Katrina, Maria or Sandy to describe a weak, open-ocean tropical storm in the future and also avoids any confusion that might occur if a notorious storm name is used again.

These names will be replaced by Dexter in 2025 and Leah in 2026.

Dorian wasn't retired last March because last year's in-person committee meeting was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, the committee tabled any consideration of name retirements from the 2019 hurricane season until this week's online meeting.

The committee also decided to discontinue the use of Greek alphabet names when a hurricane season's name list has been exhausted.

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According to Wednesday's press release, confusion with similar-sounding Greek alphabet letters and their translation into other languages were a couple of the reasons for abandoning the Greek alphabet.

Instead, the committee formulated lists of supplemental names – one for the Atlantic Basin and another for the eastern Pacific Basin – that will be used in place of the Greek alphabet when the standard list is used up in a given season. These names could be retired and replaced much like names in the standard lists.

Starting in 2021, these are the names that will be used when a given Atlantic hurricane season's primary name list is used up, instead of the Greek alphabet letters.

The 2020 Atlantic hurricane season's name list was exhausted by September, requiring the use of the backup Greek alphabet name list for only the second time. The record 30 named storms in 2020 required the first nine letters of the Greek alphabet to be used, ending with Iota.

Despite the Greek alphabet retirement, the WMO committee noted hurricanes Eta and Iota in 2020 will both be removed from any future use as names, just as any other retired name, given their notoriously deadly and destructive impacts in Central America. It was the first and only time Greek alphabet names were "retired."

Since the naming of Atlantic tropical cyclones ditched the phonetic alphabet in 1953, 93 Atlantic tropical cyclone names had been retired through 2018.

The most retirees for a single year was five during the hyperactive 2005 hurricane season. 2017 joined the 1955, 1995 and 2004 seasons with four retired names.

Only 19 seasons have not had a name retired, most recently in 2014. Another 25 seasons, through 2018, had multiple names removed from future use.

Here is a rundown of storms retired this week.

Hurricane Laura

-Category 4 landfall near Cameron, Louisiana, with 150 mph winds, tied for Louisiana's strongest landfall by wind speed.

-Over 15 feet of storm surge in Cameron Parish, which wiped homes from their foundations near the Gulf of Mexico.

-Wind gusts to 133 mph produced catastrophic damage in Cameron and Calcasieu parishes.

-Knocked out power to 900,000 customers and destroyed the electrical grid across southwestern Louisiana.

-Forty-two killed in the U.S.; estimated $19 billion of damage in the U.S., according to NOAA.

(FULL RECAP: Hurricane Laura)

Greek 'Retirements'

Hurricane Eta 2020

-Eta made landfall at Category 4 intensity on Nov. 3, 2020, near Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua.

-A 14- to 21-foot storm surge was forecast for the northeast Nicaraguan coast at landfall.

-Major rainfall flooding extended into Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, Costa Rica and El Salvador.

-Eta was also a $1.5 billion storm in the U.S., where significant flooding stretched from Florida to Virginia.

(FULL RECAP: Hurricane Eta)

Hurricane Iota 2020

-Iota made landfall at Category 4 intensity on Nov. 16, 2020, near Haulover, Nicaragua.

-This was just 15 miles south and 13 days after the landfall of Hurricane Eta.

-Before landfall, Iota became only the second Atlantic Basin Category 5 November hurricane on record.

-Massive rainfall flooding once again swamped Nicaragua, Honduras and Guatemala.

(FULL RECAP: Hurricane Iota)

Satellite image and statistics on Hurricane Iota's landfall, along with the path of Hurricane Eta earlier in November 2020.

Hurricane Dorian

-Struck the northwestern Bahamas at Category 5 intensity on Sept. 1, 2019.

-Stalled near Grand Bahama Island, lashing the northwestern Bahamas with its eyewall for 51 straight hours.

-28.25-foot peak storm surge measured at Grand Bahama International Airport.

-Estimated $3.4 billion damage in the Bahamas, according to the Bahamas Department of Meteorology.

-As of February 2020, 74 were killed in the Bahamas; another 245 were missing.

(FULL RECAP: Hurricane Dorian)

An aerial view of damage caused by Hurricane Dorian is seen in Marsh Harbour on Great Abaco Island on Sept. 4, 2019, in Great Abaco, Bahamas.

The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.

The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.