As the name of an ancient goddess of Egypt, Isis had been on the WMO list of names for hurricanes in the eastern North Pacific in 2016.
But ISIS is also used to describe the Islamic State militant group, whose forces have captured large swathes of Iraq and Syria and which stands accused by U.N. war crimes investigators of committing brutal atrocities against civilians.
The proposal by the WMO regional center was endorsed by the WMO Hurricane Committee, composed of experts from 27 member states and territories meeting in Costa Rica this week, Nullis said. “The Hurricane Committee removed the name “Isis” from the rotating list, and agreed to replace it with “Ivette”.”
The hurricane committee also chose to grant Mexico’s request to retire Odile from the list, replacing it will Odalys, which will come up in 2020’s list of names.