No storm named Fiona will ever again hit Atlantic Canada – or anywhere else in the Atlantic Ocean.
The World Meteorological Organization has removed the names Fiona and Ian from its list of tropical storm names, citing damage from hurricanes with those names in 2022.
Hurricane names in the Atlantic region are used in a six-year rotation, so Fiona and Ian were then to be used in 2028.
“Farrah will be used to replace Fiona in the name lists, while Idris will replace Ian,” the World Meteorological Organization said in a press release on Wednesday.
“Fiona was a large and powerful hurricane, which hit communities in the Lesser Antilles, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and the Turks and Caicos Islands,” the agency said. “It then moved north over the western Atlantic and hit Canada as a powerful post-tropical cyclone in September 2022, causing significant damage and loss of life. on his way.”
Fiona left many parts of Atlantic Canada with shattered forests, massive power outages and damaged homes. Prince Edward Island, Cape Breton and southwestern Newfoundland were the hardest hit regions.
At least 25 lives were lost as the storm system rolled in from the Caribbean, including a woman washed out to sea in Port aux Basques, Newfoundland, as Fiona ripped homes from their foundations.
The weather organization called Fiona “the costliest extreme weather event on record in Atlantic Canada.”
A December report by Christian Aid, a UK-based charity, identified Hurricane Fiona as one of the 10 costliest weather disasters of 2022.
With lobster season set to begin in April, the race is on to repair the wharves in the Gulf of St. Lawrence that were badly damaged by post-tropical storm Fiona. Plans include rebuilding them to withstand stronger and more unpredictable storms.
In addition to the deaths, the charity said Fiona had displaced 13,000 people and caused nearly C$4 billion in damage.
Hurricane Ian hit western Cuba before making landfall in southwest Florida with Category 4 force.
“Ian brought a devastating storm surge to southwest Florida and is responsible for over 150 direct and indirect deaths and over $112 billion in damage in the United States, making it the hurricane costliest in Florida history and third costliest in the United States,” the World Meteorological Organization said.
With the addition of Fiona and Ian, 96 names have been removed from the Atlantic Basin list since 1953, when storms began to be named.
The storms are named in the order in which they form during Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from June 1 through November 30.
For 2023, the names will be Arlene, Bret, Cindy, Don, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harold, Idalia, Jose, Katia, Lee, Margot, Nigel, Ophelia, Philippe, Rina, Sean, Tammy, Vince, Whitney. Of these, Harold, Idalia, Margot and Nigel are new names, replacing the old 2017 storm names Harvey, Irma, Maria and Nate.