Dennis the Menace

It seems Hurricane Dennis is making its (his?) move:

The first rain from Hurricane Dennis started falling Friday on the Florida Keys as the storm barreled toward the Gulf of Mexico, and forecasters warned that it might score a direct hit on the island chain.

Even if the eye passes to the west, they warned, hurricane-force winds extended up to 50 miles from the center, and tropical storm-force winds stretched up to 140 miles out.

Key West’s streets were calmer than usual early Friday, the result of an evacuation order issued a day earlier, but the Category 4 storm could batter the islands by evening, forecasters said. Morning breezes were expected to grow into stronger winds, joined by heavier rain and storm surges.

Forecasters also warned Gulf Coast residents from Florida to Louisiana to be ready for Dennis to come ashore by Sunday. With top winds at 135 mph, the storm is already ”extremely dangerous,” the National Hurricane Center said. Dennis was blamed for at least five deaths in Haiti.

Other than giving me an opportunity to use the completely unoriginal title to this post, the reason I post this is that when I read the story in the Times, I experienced a case of deja vu. Turns out it wasn’ deja vu at all, but a little thing we call memory:

Hurricane Dennis formed over the western north Atlantic on august 24th…about 225 miles east of Turks Island and the southeastern Bahamas. After strengthening to a hurricane on the 26th…Dennis produced near-hurricane conditions at Abaco Island on the 28th. Winds increased to a peak of 105 mph later on the 28th and this intensity was maintained until early on the 30th when the hurricane was centered about 115 miles off the southeast U.S. coast.

We just had another Hurricane Dennis in 1999, which leads me to ask- what are the rules for naming these damned things? How many times have we had multiple hurricanes that have the same name?

Ask, and people provide answers:

There are six lists of names that are used over and over, so it stands to reason that the 2005 names are the same as six years ago, 1999. The names of huge storms are retired, like Andrew.

The list is here.

Thanks.