'tis the quiet season

and still there's weather to talk about. as i type this, tropical storm beta is taking aim at nicaragua. this is the first time since they started naming tropical storms and hurricanes that they've had to go this far into the names list.

but here's a thought.

the last time the names list was used up (but they didn't have to go into the greek alphabet) was before satellites were up in orbit. (i couldn't find out exactly what year, though.) so that means that the named storms had to be observed by coastal stations or ships. no storms were remotely sensed. this record-setting year, quite a few of the storms wouldn't have been named had they not been observed by satellite imagery (and then the hurricane hunters).

so that leads me to wonder: if there had been satellites back then, how many names would have been gone through?

i'm willing to wager it would be more than there were this year.