List of retired Pacific typhoon names
This is a list of all Pacific typhoons that have had their names retired from the international list of tropical cyclone names used in the Western Pacific Ocean. Since tropical cyclones started to be named in the basin after World War II a total of 85 typhoon names have been retired. Those typhoons that have their names retired tend to be exceptionally destructive storms. Several names were removed or altered naming list for various reasons other than retirement.
History
During the latter stages of World War 2, forecasters with the United States Armed Forces started to informally name tropical cyclones that occurred over the Pacific Ocean, after their wives and sweethearts. In 1945, after the practice had become popular among forecasters who found that it reduced confusion during map discussions, the USAAF formalised the scheme and started to publicly assign female names to systems in the Northern Hemisphere and male names to tropical cyclones that occurred in the Southern Hemisphere. Over the next few years, the names were chosen by the 2143 Air Weather Wing and were assigned to systems when they first established as a typhoon, by warning centers in Guam, Japan or the Philippines. During 1959, in an effort to reduce redundancy and improve communications, the United States Armed Forces consolidated its various typhoon warning centres into a Joint Typhoon Warning Center, which took over the warning responsibilities on 1 May 1959. During the 1960's, the names Karen, Lucille and Ophelia were retired after Karen had impacted Guam, Lucille had killed 300 people in the Philippines and Ophelia had travelled over. In 1963, the Philippine Weather Bureau started to use Filipino women's nicknames that ended in "Ng" from A to Y, to name all tropical cyclones that occurred within its self-defined area of responsibility regardless of if the JTWC had named it.In October 1974, a United States reconnaissance aircraft and its crew of six went missing while it was investigating Typhoon Bess; as a result, the JTWC intended to replace the name with Bonnie. In August 1978, the JTWC initially named another tropical cyclone "Bess" before changing the system's name to "Bonnie" in subsequent warnings. After the 1979 tropical cyclone conference, the JTWC started to use a new list of tropical cyclone names which contained both male and female names, as well as the name Bess. At the 1983 tropical cyclone conference, the names Hazen and Pamela were retired after they had caused severe impacts to the Mariana Islands, while Bess was retired again after the 54th Weather Reconnaissance Squadron asked for it to be retired, because of the 1974 crew going missing. The name Ike was retired after it had made landfall in the Philippines and killed over 900 people during September 1984, before the name Roy was retired after it had caused widespread damage to the Mariana Islands during January 1988. The naming list was updated at the 1989 tropical cyclone conference and was used after Typhoon Wayne (1989) had been named in September 1989. The names Mike, Mirelle, Thelma and Omar were retired from the list of names in 1991, 1992 and 1993. During December 1997, Tropical Storm Paka moved into the basin and significantly impacted both the Marshall Islands and the Mariana Islands before its name was retired from the list of Pacific hurricane names.
In December 1995, the Hong Kong Observatory proposed that the ESCAP/WMO's Typhoon Committee should be the body that named tropical cyclones over the Western Pacific Ocean and the South China Sea, which they hoped would lead to the names being standardised over the region. In response the committee noted that the implementation of the proposal would be a long process and that it would need to collaborate with other bodies, while it urged its members to consider the proposal ahead of discussions during forthcoming sessions. At the start of 1996, the JTWC introduced a brand new list of names, before the Typhoon Committee revisited the proposal at its 30th session in November 1997, where it was suggested that the usage of Asian names over the region would make warnings more effective by enhancing people's alertness to an approaching tropical cyclone. As a result, they decided to endorse the proposal, before instructing a task force to work out the details of the scheme, in order to present a list of names for approval at the next session of the committee. The task force met during August 1998 and decided that each of the fourteen committee members, including the United States and the Philippines, would submit ten names each, which would be used in alphabetical order, by the English name of the country. It was also decided that the names would consist of no more than nine characters, be easy to pronounce, have no negative implications and should not cause any difficulties for any contributor or be the name of a commercial brand. In the interests of harmony and cooperation, it was decided that any name proposed should have the support of all contributors and that a single objection would be sufficient to veto a proposed name. A list of 140 names was subsequently drawn up and submitted to the Typhoon Committee's 31st session, where the naming list was approved.
Over the next year, the spelling of a few of the names were slightly modified, before they started to be used by the Japan Meteorological Agency on 1 January 2000, with the first name: Damrey being named on 7 May 2000. At its 33rd session in November 2000, the committee was informed that the India Meteorological Department had objected to the name Hanuman being used as a name for religious sentiments, while the United States requested that the name Kodo be changed as it would have an undesirable meaning if mispronounced. At the same session, the Thai Meteorological Department requested that the spelling of several names be corrected and indicated a desire to change the names Prapiroon, Durian and Khanun. In response the committee accepted the spelling changes, before establishing a procedure for the replacement of tropical cyclone names, so that all members would have a chance to comment on the appropriateness of the name. In November 2002, the committee retired the name: Vamei after it became the first tropical cyclone to occur near the equator on record, while the names Rusa and Chattan were retired after impacting Micronesia, Korea, and Japan. At its 37th session in November 2004, the committee decided to retire the names Pongsona, Maemi, Sudal and Rananim, after they had impacted the Mariana Islands, the Philippines, China and Japan. During April 2005, the HKO in conjunction with Radio 1 of the Radio Television Hong Kong invited the public to submit names in both English and Chinese, after which a judging panel selected Taichi and Kapok, as replacement names for Yanyan and Tingting which were removed at Hong Kongs request. At its 38th session, the committee rejected the names Taichi and Kapok in favour of Dolphin and Lionrock, as the former had negative implications in other languages, while it retired the names Matsa, Nabi and Longwang, after they had impacted the Mariana Islands, China, Japan, and South Korea.
During August 2006, Hurricane Ioke moved into the basin from the Central Pacific and significantly impacted Wake Island, before it was retired from the list of Pacific hurricane names. Later that year, the Committee retired the names Chanchu, Bilis, Saomai, Xangsane and Durian, after they had caused significant impacts to the Philippines, Taiwan, China. There were no names retired by the committee after the 2007 and 2008 seasons, before the names Morakot, Ketsana, Parma, Fanapi, Washi, Bopha, Utor, Fitow and Haiyan were retired at the 42nd, 43rd, 44th, 45th, 46th sessions of the Typhoon Committee, after causing significant impacts to the Philippines, Taiwan, China. At the 46th session in 2014, the name Sonamu was also retired from the list, after it had caused unprecedented panic in coastal parts of eastern Malaysia, due to its similarity to the word "tsunami". The name Vicente was also removed to avoid any potential confusion, after it was noted that the name appeared on the naming lists for both the Western Pacific and the Eastern Pacific. Over the next few years, the names Rammasun, Soudelor, Mujigae, Koppu, Melor, Meranti, Sarika, Haima, Nock-ten, Hato, Kai-tak, Tembin, Rumbia, Mangkhut, Yutu, Lekima, Faxai, Hagibis, Kammuri, Phanfone, Vongfong, Linfa, Molave, Goni and Vamco were all retired after causing significant impacts to various countries in the region.
In April 2022, the Typhoon Committee received an email from the United Kingdom's Met Office, which noted that there had been considerable reaction among Greek-speaking social media users to the name Malakas for a typhoon due to its alternative meaning. As a result, the name was retired by the committee at its 55th session in March 2023, along with the names Conson, Kompasu, Rai, Megi, Ma-on and Hinnamnor, which had impacted China, Korea, the Philippines and Vietnam.