Goodbye Gustav, Ike and Paloma. We hardly knew ye.
Actually we knew a little too much of these hurricanes, which is why the three names have been retired by the World Meteorological Organization today.
You have to be a bad mamma jamma to get retired as a hurricane and those three names were among the worst on record. Each was reached Category 4 status and left death and destruction in its wake.
Gustav killed 112 people last year in Haiti and Cuba and caused billions of dollars in damage to both island nations.
Ike killed more than 80 people as it cut a path through the Caribbean before hitting Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas in August and September. The damage tab in the U.S. was more than $19 billion.
Paloma got a little less fan fare than the two that came before it, but the November storm still caused $300 million in damage to Cuba.
Gustav, Ike and Paloma can pull a Brett Favre and return from retirement in 2014 based on a six-year rotation of storm names.
They are replaced by Gonzalez, Isaias and Paulette.
We hope we don’t get to know them any time soon.
