WMO Hurricane Committee retires Irene from tropical storm list of names

Hurricane Irene over the southern Bahamas on August 24
Credit: NASA

Irene has been retired from the official list of Atlantic Basin tropical storm names by the World Meteorological Organization Regional Association IV Hurricane Committee because of the deaths and damage the hurricane caused in August 2011. The name will be replaced with Irma.

The decision to remove Irene from the rotating list of tropical cyclone names was taken during the Hurricane Committee's annual meeting in Florida, the United States of America. The Committee is responsible for the list of storm names used every six years for both the Atlantic and eastern North Pacific basins.

Irene became a hurricane on August 22 and intensified to a Category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale on August 24 while centered between Mayaguana and Grand Inagua in the Bahamas. It gradually weakened after crossing the Bahamas, making landfall in North Carolina on August 27 as a Category 1 hurricane. Irene made another landfall the next day as a tropical storm very near Atlantic City, New Jersey. The center moved over Coney Island and Manhattan, New York, the same day.
Irene caused widespread damage across a large portion of the eastern United States as it moved north-northeastward, bringing significant effects from the mid-Atlantic through New England. The most severe impact of Irene was catastrophic inland flooding in New Jersey, Massachusetts and Vermont.
Irene was directly responsible for 49 deaths: five in the Dominican Republic, three in Haiti, and 41 in the United States. For the United States, six deaths are attributed to storm surge/waves or rip currents, 15 to wind, including falling trees, and 21 to rainfall-induced floods. Including flood losses, damage in the United States is estimated to be $15.8 billion.

Irene is the 76th name to be retired from the Atlantic list since 1954. Names are withdrawn if a storm is so deadly or costly that the future use of its name would be insensitive. Examples include Katrina (USA, 2005), Andrew (Bahamas and USA, 1992) and Mitch (Honduras, 1998).

The practice of naming storms (tropical cyclones) began years ago in order to help in the quick identification of storms in warning messages because names are presumed to be far easier to remember that numbers and technical terms. In the beginning, storms were named arbitrarily. An Atlantic storm that ripped off the mast of a boat named Antje became known as Antje's hurricane. Then the mid-1900's saw the start of the practice of using feminine names for storms.
In the pursuit of a more organized and efficient naming system, meteorologists later decided to identify storms using names from a list arranged alphabetically. Thus, a storm with a name which begins with A, like Anne, would be the first storm to occur in the year. Since 1953, Atlantic tropical storms have been named from lists originated by the National Hurricane Center. The original name lists featured only women's names. In 1979, men's names were introduced and they alternate with the women's names. Six lists are used in rotation.

More details on the tropical cyclone name system

- WMO