As people mourn Dolly Parton, the National Hurricane Center is watching a tropical wave that could become the fourth named storm of the 2026 Atlantic season. The next name on the list is Dolly.
Roger Edwards, a meteorologist who retired from NOAA in 2025, called the timing an “astounding coincidence.” Edwards, a longtime Parton fan, wrote that in a social media tribute as people remembered her music and charity work, USA TODAY reported.
The name was chosen about 30 years ago. It is not a tribute. Parton died Tuesday at 80.
The hurricane center told USA TODAY it has no plans to skip Dolly if a storm forms. NHC does not pick the names or decide when they are used. “Instead a strict procedure has been established by an international committee of the World Meteorological Organization,” the center’s website says.
What NHC is watching
As of 2 p.m. EDT Wednesday, NHC said there are no tropical cyclones in the Atlantic. Forecasters are watching one disturbance: an area of low pressure tied to a tropical wave a few hundred miles west-southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands.
Showers and thunderstorms with the system had changed little over the previous several hours. Conditions are somewhat favorable for development, and a tropical depression could form in the next day or two as it moves west to west-northwest near 20 mph across the eastern and central tropical Atlantic, NHC forecaster Richard Pasch wrote. Conditions are expected to become less favorable by the weekend.
Official formation chances Wednesday afternoon were 60 percent over 48 hours and 60 percent over seven days. A system gets a name only after sustained winds reach 39 mph. If this one does, it becomes Tropical Storm Dolly.
The wave is thousands of miles from Florida. Wednesday’s outlook keeps it over the far eastern Atlantic. There is no Tampa Bay threat from this system this week.
Three named storms have already formed this year: Arthur in June, Bertha in July and Cristobal in August. None reached hurricane strength.
Where the name comes from
Atlantic names come from six rotating alphabetical lists kept by a WMO committee. The lists recycle every six years. After each season, the committee can retire a name if a storm was so deadly or costly that using it again would be insensitive. Replacement names are meant to be short and easy to pronounce. They are not named after specific people.
Dolly first appeared on the 1996 list. It replaced Diana, retired after a 1990 hurricane that struck Mexico and killed 139 people, USA TODAY reported. The name was used three times during Parton’s lifetime, most recently for a tropical storm in 2020. In 2008, Hurricane Dolly peaked as a Category 2, then hit the southeastern tip of Texas as a Category 1.
Parton and disaster relief
After Hurricane Helene in 2024, Parton announced a $1 million personal donation for flooding in North Carolina and East Tennessee. She said her businesses pledged another $1 million, the Knoxville News Sentinel reported. During that announcement she sang a rewritten line of “Jolene”: “Helene, Helene, Helene, you came in here and broke us all apart.”
She had also helped after 2021 flooding in Waverly, Tennessee, and after wildfires in 2016.
Parton died Aug. 25 at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center in Nashville after a brief battle with cancer, publicist Marcel Pariseau said. Her nephew Bryan Seaver announced her death in a video on her social media accounts.
For the latest official outlook, go to the National Hurricane Center.