We May Run Out of Hurricane Storm Names in 2024

With experts predicting 20-25 named storms, meteorologists could run out of names to use for tropical storms and hurricanes.

Although the alphabet has 26 letters, Q, U, X, Y and Z are skipped, leaving 21 names. So what happens when we run out?

The Greek alphabet was used in the past to name storms, starting with Alpha, but that rule was changed by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) in 2021.

“The use of the Greek alphabet was not expected to be frequent enough to warrant any change in the existing naming procedure,” the WMO said on its website. “However, after the record-breaking 2020 season, the WMO Regional Association IV Hurricane Committee annual session in 2021 decided to end the use of the Greek alphabet and instead established two lists of supplemental tropical cyclone names, one for the Atlantic, one for the Pacific.”