Hurricane season officially begins June 1st with a new list of names for the 2022 season. Alex will be the first named storm, followed by Bonnie then Colin.
The World Meteorological Organization has six lists of names that are used in rotation and re-cycled every six years. The only time that there is a change in the list is if a storm is so deadly or costly that the future use of its name for a different storm would be inappropriate for reasons of sensitivity. If that occurs, then at an annual meeting by the WMO committee the offending name is stricken from the list and another name is selected to replace it. Several names have been retired since the lists were created.
If more than twenty-one named tropical cyclones occur in the Atlantic basin in a season any additional storms will take names from an alternate list of names approved by the WMO.
In the last seven years at least one storm developed in May, before the season began.
Last year, Ana became a tropical storm in May and in 2020, there were three named storms before the season officially began.
So, starting in 2021, the National Hurricane Center issues Tropical Weather Outlooks starting on May 15th rather than June 1st to stay ahead of early development.
Look for updates here and remember it's best to be prepared and have a plan in place well before any hurricane or tropical storm threatens your area.