Subtropical Storm Wanda wraps up hurricane season’s ABCs

MIAMI (AP) — Subtropical Storm Wanda has formed in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, and with that, forecasters again reached the end of the English alphabet, with a month still to go this Atlantic hurricane season.

Wanda has hardly strengthened since it formed on Saturday, reaching top sustained winds of 45 mph (75 kmh), and poses no threat to land. Forecasters predicted Monday that it will wobble around for several days before dissipating far from any coast.

More notable is that with Wanda, the U.S. National Hurricane Center has now used up its initial list of 21 named storms for the second consecutive year.

Names beginning with Q, U, X, Y and Z have been deemed too hard to pronounce when it comes to storm warnings. And don’t expect Alpha to Omega if still more storms take shape: The World Meteorological Organization voted this year to retire the Greek alphabet as too confusing. A different, supplemental list of names has been approved instead, from Adria to Will.