How do hurricanes get their names?

Have you ever shared a name with a tropical storm or hurricane? Chances are you have. 

Believe it or not, tropical cyclones have been given names since the early 1950s.

While the names may seem familiar to some, and foreign to others, there is a method to the madness.

FOX 5 Storm Team Meteorologist Jonathan Stacey explains. Watch the video to join the conversation.

How do storms and hurricanes get their names?

First things first, the National Hurricane Center does not control the naming of tropical cyclones.

The names are maintained and updated by an international committee of the United Nations World Meteorological Organization.

A list of 21 names, A through W, are produced each year for tropical cyclones that turn into tropical storms and hurricanes in the Atlantic Basin.

Names that start with the letters Q, X, Y and Z are not included on the lists.

The names tend to have either English, Spanish or French language origins.

And the traditional gender of a name that corresponds to its first letter alternates each year. For example, the 2023 "D"-named storm is Don – a traditional male name. So in 2024, the "D"-named storm will be named Debby, a traditional female name.

A list of names is used in rotation, and recycled every six years. That means the 2023 list will be used again in 2029.

There are exceptions to this rule.

If a storm is so deadly or costly that the future use of its name for a different storm would be inappropriate for reasons of sensitivity – like Katrina or Harvey – the name will be retired and replaced.

If more than 21 named tropical cyclones occur in the Atlantic Basin in a season, an alternate list of another 21 names is used. The Greek alphabet is no longer used for back-up.

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