Hurricane names for 2018 are out: Are you on the list?

The National Hurricane Center's official list of Atlantic tropical cyclone names for 2018 is out – did your name make the cut this year?

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Actually, there's not much mystery to the list because the names are used in rotation and recycled every six years. For instance, many of the names in 2018 will be used again in 2024.

But sometimes the named storms gain enough notoriety for their death and damage that the names are “retired” from the list – sort of the meteorological version of retiring the jersey number of a star athlete.

Four storms last year had their names retired: Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria and Tropical Storm Nate.

Harvey, a Category 4 hurricane that devastated Houston and the Texas Gulf Coast, was the second-costliest storm in U.S. history; Irma tore across the island chains in the Caribbean Sea, killing more than 100 people; and Maria pummeled Puerto Rico, where many islanders still remain without power.

Nate hit Central America as a tropical storm before moving north to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Their names will be replaced in the 2023 list with Harold, Idalia, Margot and Nigel.

The names of Atlantic tropical storms are maintained and updated through a strict procedure by an international committee of the World Meteorological Organization.

When the Atlantic hurricane season starts June 1, the sequence of names for 2018 will be:

• Alberto
• Beryl
• Chris
• Debby
• Ernesto
• Florence
• Gordon
• Helene
• Isaac
• Joyce
• Kirk
• Leslie
• Michael
• Nadine
• Oscar
• Patty
• Rafael
• Sara
• Tony
• Valerie
• William

Next year's sequence of names goes like this: Andrea, Barry, Chantal, Dorian, Erin, Fernand, Gabrielle, Humberto, Imelda, Jerry, Karen, Lorenzo, Melissa, Nestor, Olga, Pablo, Rebekah, Sebastien, Tanya, Van and Wendy

Cox Media Group