FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - As hurricane names, Dean, Felix and Noel are no more.

Because the three tropical systems caused significant death and destruction last year, they have been retired, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced Tuesday.

"Basically, the names are retired for sensitivity reasons," Dennis Feltgen, spokesman for the National Hurricane Center in Miami-Dade County said.

Dean, Felix and Noel, which were first used in 1979, have been replaced with Dorian, Fernand and Nestor. And yes, Feltgen said, that is "Fernand," not Ferdinand.

"That is a legitimate name," he said.

A committee of the World Meteorological Organization maintains the lists of storm names and recycles them every six years.

Dean reached Category 5 strength and struck Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula on Aug. 21 and Tuxpan, Mexico the next day as a Category 2 system. The storm was blamed for 32 deaths across the Caribbean.

Felix struck Punta Gorda, Nicaragua on Sept. 4, also as a Category 5 hurricane. It accounted for 130 deaths in Nicaragua and Honduras.

As a tropical storm, Noel was responsible for at least 160 deaths in the Dominican Republic, Haiti and the Bahamas in late October. Noel became a Category 1 hurricane Nov. 1.

Since tropical storms were first given names in 1953, 70 names have been retired, the first two being Carol and Hazel in 1954.

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By Ken Kaye / South Florida Sun-Sentinel

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