Who chooses the names?
The names for each of these natural phenomena exist even before they occur. According to the National Water Commission (Conagua), every year, before the cyclone season begins, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) already has the list of names that will receive the tropical storms and hurricanes that occur.
The Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources (Semarnat) specifies that these lists are repeated every six years and contain female and male names, for each letter of the alphabet, in Spanish, English and French. This means that the 2023 list will be used again in 2029.
The organization details that at some point it became customary to name cyclones with the saint of the day in which “their destructive power hit some region with greater force.” Furthermore, in the past only women’s names were used to refer to meteorological phenomena, but this practice was abandoned after 1979.
Can names change?
When an event of this nature is particularly catastrophic, affected countries can request the WMO to remove the name from the list. Mexico did it in 2014 with Ingrid and Manuel. At that time the WMO approved the request and replaced the names with Imelda and Mario.
The names can also change by provision of the WMO, this happens when “a hurricane causes fatal losses, as well as extensive material damage, its name is removed and replaced on the list by another that begins with the same letter,” according to Semarnat. .
The names for cyclones are also divided depending on where they come from, meaning there is a list for the Atlantic Ocean, Eastern North Pacific (which is where Otis came from) and Central North Pacific, the latter containing four lists. That is to say that in total there are six rotating lists.