NJ hurricane season here and these names won’t scare anybody

June 1 begins hurricane season each year. And each year there’s a new crop of rotating hurricane names put out by the World Meteorological Association.

Most of us are quite familiar with it. They are alphabetized and it’s a way of keeping better track of storms when you often can have multiple hurricanes tracking at the same time.

This year’s Hurricane names are…

Alex

Bonnie

Colin

Danielle

Earl

Fiona

Gaston

Hermine

Ian

Julia

Karl

Lisa

Martin

Nicole

Owen

Paula

Richard

Shary

Tobias

Virginie

Walter

When a hurricane has done so much damage that its very name invokes a certain dread, the National Hurricane Center and the World Meteorological Association retire the name permanently. Kind of like Michael Jordan’s number being retired.

Ida is one example. Its remnants caused such severe flash flooding in New Jersey that 30 people died here. Sandy, of course, was permanently retired as well. Floyd and Igor are imposing names with their given history and were put out to pasture, too.

But how imposing are some of this year’s hurricane names? Obviously, devastation changes all that, but just on the surface does "Alex" sound intimidating? I think of Alex P. Keaton here arguing with his sister Mallory waiting for Skippy to stop by.

Tobias? If you’re an “Arrested Development” fan there’s not a chance you’ll take warnings about Tobias making landfall seriously.

Walter? Unless we name a hurricane Walter White I’m picking up on a serious birdwatching stamp collecting vibe. Not intimidating. Lisa? Nicole? Come on. These sound like characters rejected by “Riverdale” for being too vanilla.

Now if you want to strike fear in some Jersey hearts how about names we associate with bad things? Like Phil Murphy. John List. Richard Hauptmann.

No wait. We have it. The hurricane no one wants to confront. The one that will tear the plywood right off these windows if it doesn’t get to speak with a manager NOW.

Karen.

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Jeff Deminski only.

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