Rarely do hurricanes hit Illinois, but it is always interesting to learn more about them. In school, students will be familiar with Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Sandy, Hurricane Harvey, just to name a few. 

The Hurricane season in 2020 has been busier than ever. All twenty-one names for this hurricane season have been used up and are currently using the Greek Alphabet. It is the second time since 2005 that the National Hurricane Center (NHC)  has had to use the Greek Alphabet. 

According to NHC, the United States had been using female names for hurricanes until 1978. In 1979, they decided to include the male along with female names. Every year, the names are always altered for male and females during the Hurricane season. Every season, there are always 21 names in the alphabet. Q, U, X, Y, and Z are not included because these names are not common. 

In order for a Hurricane name to retire, it will determine based on the damage and cost of the specific hurricane during the season. After the Hurricane name is retired, then a new male or female name will be replaced. 

It is possible that all 21 names can be used up before the season is over. Once all 21 names have been used up, it will move forward with Greek Alphabet starting with Alpha.

The Greek Alphabet contains twenty-four alphabets, but it is very rare to use all twenty-four. In the 2005 Hurricane season, they only used six Greek Alphabets from Alpha to Zeta.