The names Dora and Otis were removed from the hurricane list

The WMO said on Wednesday that Otis was removed from the list of northeast Pacific hurricanes, as was Dora, which left bad memories in Hawaii.

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Otilio and Deborah are used for this list of names overseen by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

It was established to facilitate communication and better warn the public of the dangers of encountering these hazardous weather events.

Names are repeated every six years, unless a storm is so deadly that its name is retired.

Such was the case with Otis when it crashed into a tourist resort in Acapulco, Mexico in October 2023, causing more than $3 billion in damage and killing 51 people.

Otis is the strongest hurricane in the eastern Pacific.

The WMO Hurricane Group removed Dora from the Northeast Pacific name list, “not because of direct damage, but because of the sensitivity of the name Dora and the indirect meteorological role it played in the August 2023 wildfires in Maui, Hawaii.”

Dora is the second hurricane to cross three basins of the Pacific Ocean, after John in 1994.

The WMO also highlighted that for the first time since 2014 no names were removed from the Atlantic Basin list.

“The work of the hurricane team is essential to ensure everyone living in the Atlantic and eastern Pacific basins is prepared for the upcoming 2024 hurricane season and to minimize the impacts of these dangerous storms on life and property,” said Dr. Michael Brennan. , president of the hurricane team.

“We all know that 2023 was the warmest year on record. The development of El Niño in the Pacific Ocean played a role. But we have also seen unprecedented ocean warming in the North and Tropical Atlantic. This will continue in 2024,” WMO Secretary-General Celeste Salo underlined. .

Record-setting Atlantic Ocean temperatures helped fuel an above-average hurricane season in 2023 and provided a powerful counterbalance to traditional El Niño influences.

This natural weather phenomenon reduces the number of hurricanes and reaches the end of its most recent cycle.

Hurricane season lasts from early June to late October.