The damage from Hurricane Irene is still being tallied, so its place in history is yet to be determined. Kevin Ambrose, an Oakton, VA, resident and writer for the Washington Post's Capital Weather Gang, offered his list of the top five most dangerous hurricanes and tropical storms to have affected the Washington area.

The list of five includes storms that occurred before the hurricane naming system, beginning with a storm from 1896 and ending with Hurricane Isabel in 2003. A photo of Hurricane Isabel's damage to the area shows an uprooted tree that fell on an Oakton home.

Click here for the full blog post.

And while we're on the topic of hurricane damage, did you ever wonder why you hear some hurricane names again? Or why some names disappear?

Here's why, straight from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration:

For Atlantic hurricanes, there is one list for each of six years. In other words, one list is repeated every seventh year. The only time that there is a change is if a storm is so deadly or costly that the future use of its name on a different storm would be inappropriate for reasons of sensitivity. If that occurs, then at an annual meeting the offending name is stricken from the list and a replacement is selected.

There is an exception to the retirement rule, however. Before 1979, when the first permanent six-year storm name list began, some storm names were simply not used anymore. For example, in 1966, "Fern" was substituted for "Frieda," and no reason was cited.

Below is a list of retired names, in alphabetical order, for hurricanes from the Atlantic Ocean: