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No storm named Fiona will ever again make landfall in Atlantic Canada – or anywhere else in the Atlantic Ocean.
The World Meteorological Organization has retired the names Fiona and Ian from the list of tropical storm names, citing the damage caused by hurricanes with that name in 2022.
Atlantic hurricane names are used on a six-year rotation, so Fiona and Ian will next be used in 2028.
“Farrah will be used to replace Fiona on the list of names, while Idris will replace Ian,” the World Meteorological Organization said in a press release on Wednesday.
“Fiona was a major and powerful storm, which hit communities in the Lesser Antilles, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Turks and Caicos,” the agency said. “It will then move north in the western Atlantic and strike Canada as a strong post-tropical cyclone in September 2022, causing significant damage and loss of life along its path.”
Fiona left many parts of Atlantic Canada with devastated forests, power outages and destroyed homes. Prince Edward Island, Cape Breton and southwestern Newfoundland are the hardest-hit areas.
At least 25 lives were lost as the storm system rolled off the Caribbean, including a woman who was washed out to sea in Port aux Basques, NL, when Fiona tore homes off their foundations.
The weather organization called Fiona “the costliest extreme weather event on record in Atlantic Canada.”
A report published in December by Christian Aid, a UK-based charity, identified Storm Fiona as one of the 10 costliest climate disasters in 2022.
With the lobster season beginning in April, the race will be to repair piers in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence that were badly damaged by post-tropical storm Fiona. The plan includes rebuilding to withstand stronger and more unpredictable storms.
As well as deaths, the charity said Fiona displaced 13,000 people and caused nearly $4 billion Cdn in damage.
Hurricane Ian struck western Cuba before making landfall in southwest Florida at Category 4 strength.
“Ian caused a devastating storm surge in southwest Florida and was responsible for more than 150 direct and indirect deaths and more than US$112 billion in damage in the United States, making it the costliest hurricane in Florida’s history and the third costliest in America States,” the World Meteorological Organization said.
With the addition of Fiona and Ian, 96 names have been retired from the Atlantic basin list since 1953, when storms began to be named.
The storms are named according to the order in which they form during the Atlantic hurricane season, which lasts from June 1 to 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. From that, Harold, Idalia, Margot and Nigel are the new names, replacing the retired 2017 hurricane names Harvey, Irma, Maria and Nate.
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