Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tropical cyclones/Archive 24

Possible mass deletion of TC articles within TC project

For storms that are not considered notable, which encompasses "fish storms" that did not establish any significant record and caused no loss of life, at least two editors seem to be leaning towards deletion. A number of them are GA quality. It would be better discussed within the project page than the individual storm talk pages, as not everyone edits all articles. Thegreatdr (talk) 05:03, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm all for this, we really need to pull back on what's necessary. Cyclonebiskit (talk) 05:44, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

(ec)In the past, fish storm articles were often bloated, and had some content that didn't appear in more... legitimate articles. That includes naming history ("X storm was not retired and was reused in Y year"), mentioning things that did not happen ("there were no tropical cyclone warnings, no ships recorded TS winds"), and ACE (which we agreed was hardly worth mentioning for individual storms). As a result, those fish storm articles are not the length that they used to be, and so they look much more... stubby. Most of them are glorified byproducts of the TCR. I am completely in favor (as if anyone had any doubt) of merging those fish storm articles. For me, my qualifier would be if there are any sources independent of the warning center that issued advisories on it (and not just news organizations reproducing advisories). --Hurricanehink (talk) 05:46, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

My proposed articles for merge (since 2000) are listed below. Cyclonebiskit (talk) 06:11, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Atlantic

East Pacific

I'm fine with all but the 2000 October subtropical storm, which I've found was actually a pretty significant Canadian storm (but the article doesn't mention it). --Hurricanehink (talk) 06:16, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

My personal opinion is that all named storms are inherently notable and should have their own articles. But that may be just me. - The Bushranger _{Return fire}^{Flank speed} 06:19, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
- Well, nothing is inherently notable. Not to mention, all named storms, as in worldwide? No offense, but such a statement is rather short-sighted. Storms have been named for several decades, and a bunch of them have very little info on them. --Hurricanehink (talk) 06:30, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - It's a fair cop, I reckon. My Inclusionist streak is still twitching, though. :) - The Bushranger _{Return fire}^{Flank speed} 07:54, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I blame the sluggish economy for the tightening of the belts within the TC project. =P In all seriousness though, this issue has needed to be addressed for some time. I was fine with staying in the background and seeing how it all played out, but we've had such turnover in this project, a rethink is needed. Thegreatdr (talk) 06:35, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We just don't have the money to maintain all these articles anymore ;) Cyclonebiskit (talk) 06:57, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Clearly we need to spin things to our advantage... - The Bushranger _{Return fire}^{Flank speed} 07:54, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am not comfortable doing a mass deletion just like that, with no input from outside the WikiProject. This should really be sent to WP:AFD and discussed there. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 10:06, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A lot of these just barely meet WP:N, just by virtue of being in the Atlantic Ocean. Aside from widespread mention, most, if not all, of the articles I listed above are ones easily forgotten and lack notibility outside of "Tropical Storm/Hurricane XYZ existed X miles from land and had no impact" Cyclonebiskit (talk) 12:31, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, this wouldn't be deletion, per se, just redirecting to List of Fooian hurricanes in 2525, right? - The Bushranger _{Return fire}^{Flank speed} 14:05, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Even better than redirecting, all of them would be merged. There is a difference between deleting and merging, and in the latter we keep most of the content (see here). Hurricanehink (talk) 15:17, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

And all of these arguments can also be presented in a deletion nomination. While I see your points, nobody is addressing mine: there is no input from anyone outside WPTC on what to do with the articles. As such, I insist on sending the articles to AFD. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 20:12, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Im launching an RFC as i think it would be better discussed here than clogging up AFD.Jason Rees (talk) 21:21, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm all for refining our content, but this is becoming excessive. Hurricane Danny (2003), for example, is a high-quality A-Class article with plenty of content to support itself; merging it serves no purpose other than to merely prove we can do so. Honestly, until I see a valid, factual argument for each article to be lossfully reduced to a few sentences, I'm going to object. An article should be merged or deleted iff it blatantly fails notability criteria (ie. literally no information can be obtained from reliable sources) or it is of such a low quality that it harms the project's reputation; the majority of these articles, being "Good articles" or higher, fail to meet either of these perquisites. Proposing a mass deletion of 50 articles under the umbrella goal of "[pulling] back on what's necessary" seems highly counterproductive, both procedurally and practically. There are quite a few articles I believe should be dealt with by way of merging, but they should be assessed on a by-case basis. Juliancolton (talk) 00:51, 3 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

But a lot of the articles might no longer be deserving of GA status. As I said before, the articles used to be padded with trivial details, which the project no longer desires to have in the articles. Calling an article "good" that is essentially a rehash of the tropical cyclone report is what is problematic, IMO. And most of them do blatantly fail the notability criteria, since most of them only have sources that derive from the NHC. Hurricanehink (talk) 00:58, 3 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting RFC. I should note that WP:GAR exists, so that would appear to be a start for your project if there are issues with good articles no longer meeting criteria. Strange Passerby (talk • contribs) 01:42, 3 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It sounds like deletion/merger of sub-GA articles would cause much less heartburn, no? Thegreatdr (talk) 05:04, 3 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yea, that is what we have been doing, and I think that does ultimately work better, on a case-by-case. I think a general, large-scale discussion is helpful, still. So shall we decide them more on a case-by-case? Hurricanehink (talk) 05:44, 3 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I oppose the merging of Hurricane Elida (2008), one, it probably had the greatest amount of impact out our candidates. Two: well written, well referenced, and MH too long to be merged into the season article.--12george1 (talk) 19:22, 3 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I oppose Douglas 08, Ivo 07, and Blanca 09 on similar grounds. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 15:02, 4 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Elida and Douglas contain bloated Met histories which contain excessive (and at times useless) information. I originally meant to condense Elida and Hernan's articles but never got around to it. However, since they're lacking in notability, I would think it best to just merge them. Cyclonebiskit (talk) 15:14, 4 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In my opinion the status of an article should mean absolutely nothing when it comes to merging. If consensus deems an FA and/or GA should be canned, we should have the major right to get rid of them via means necessary GAR / FAR, you name it. Also I think AFDing anything is worthless as all of these would be merges, not deletion. (AFD is a horrible place anyway) I do feel that adding Barry 07 and TD 10 05 to that list applies. I know my opinion is valid because my list of 94 articles is what started this argument on notability. This is an epidemic that Tropical Storm Lee 05 started and it has taken us five years to solve the problem! We've needed this large discussion and I feel its warranted to merge articles.Mitch32^{(Transportation Historian)} 15:55, 4 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't list Barry `07, although its impact was mostly minimal, in terms of damage and deaths, its impact was very widespread, reaching from the Florida Keys to central Maine, some of the eastern seaboard major hurricanes can't even do that. Even still, it is a very nice article, and very informative. If your gonna merge Barry of `07 you might wanna take the bat on Jerry and Iris of `95 while your at it. BTW, does anyway have a list of candidates for merge in their opinion during like the 70s, 80s, or 90s?--12george1 (talk) 18:58, 4 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Oh I forgot to say, here is an article that should be added to the list: Tropical Depression Ten (2005). I think this should be merge, the only reason that it is an existence is that it was partially the cause of the development of Hurricane Katrina, which is not a notable fact at all. The depression itself had not impact on land, nor did it pose a threat to land, so that should place on the list and merged. There are several cases like this where a previous tropical cyclone re-developed into something more significant, and the initial and/or the second cyclone doesn't have an article (e.g. TD6-Hurricane Kristy 1988, TD6-Hurricane Lorena 1989, TD9-Hurricane Octave, and the list goes on and on), so there should be no reason for TD 10 of 05 to have an article, but there is a valid reason why TD11-E and Hermine both have their own article (don't start that arguement again).--12george1 (talk) 19:41, 4 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I agree that the status of an article should not matter. A storm with no damage is a storm, in most cases, non-notable. My opinion is merge ones which are obviously not notable (no impact, records) and let the others go on a case by case basis. Next, we should put our guidelines into writing so this wouldn't happen again. We should have clear and concise rules, and any storm not meeting that standard should not be created or should be merged immediately. Darren 23^Edits|Mail 00:35, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As a minimum, can we agree that, at a minimum, a storm had to affect land? Any storm that didn't affect land falls into the same category, in that the only sources on it have content that is derived from the warning center. That pretty much fails the requirement that there are independent sources. --Hurricanehink (talk) 03:19, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What about Category 5 hurricanes? If you proposal is used these articles are being merged. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 03:24, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Then even simpler. At a minimum, there has to be sources on the storm outside of the warning center (and that means newspaper reprints of an advisory would still not be outside of the warning center). --Hurricanehink (talk) 03:31, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ill agree to that. My three issues I listed were addressed so I am fine wit that. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 03:40, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yea, and I think it'd be a start. --Hurricanehink (talk) 03:40, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, I created this to help detirme which storms are notable as well as the quality of the articles. Any help is more than welcome. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 05:16, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am just wondering if the TC project adopts the German Wp deletion mentality. Do we lack of place to store those articles or what's going on? Dont't forget to merge Hurricane John (1994) – despite its long meteorological history the storm lacks of impact and, according to Hurricanhink's argumentation therefor lacks of notability. --Matthiasb (talk) 19:27, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We could appeal to IAR, the fact that it is the longest-lasting TC, and its necessity for a FT, to justify keeping the particular case of John. In other words, we have to recognize complexity and subtlety. It will result in controversial and heated discussions, but it's more flexible than a simplistic bright line rule. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 23:47, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

How did John become into disscussion? It passes WP:N and did impact land. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 23:58, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To Matthiasb- You're taking the idea to the extremes and on only one of the factors which would determine whether or not to have an article. Although John '94 did not have much in the way of impact, it was meteorologically significant in that it was a Category 5 (on average there tends to be three or so a year worldwide), it was the longest lasting tropical cyclone in history, a full month, one of a handful of Category 5 storms to pass close to Hawaii and one of a few to cross the International Dateline twice. Cyclonebiskit (talk) 00:09, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Not to mention, John caused $15 million in damage. How is that in anyway lacking notability, per my argument? Also, Matthiasb, if you read what I proposed, John would clearly pass the criteria. It appears in many sources outside of the warning center. I just wanted to get some sort of rule set in place, which abides by existing WP criteria anyway. --Hurricanehink (talk) 03:44, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think we can take the rest of the articles by a case by case basis as Erick still (but barley) meets the first criteria. Should I give my 2 cents on what should be merged or not? Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 03:57, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, Erick doesn't. I checked all of its sources, and every one (but the last one, "Earthweek", said "according to the National Hurricane Center". --Hurricanehink (talk) 04:24, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ref #13 is a NWS source, but not an NHC source. Even so it is probably going to get merged anyway. Should a I send it to FAR even though I have no objections to keeping the article? Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 14:48, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, we should save Erick for now and focus on the others. When we get some sort of consistency, we could pursue things further, but there are others that are much easier to handle. --Hurricanehink (talk) 18:22, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, we will come back to Erick later (if ever). IMO, we should go through the rest of the articles one by one so when a new article gets created that has marginal notability, we can take it case by case and let a discuss form instead of the article being merged 5 minuets later. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 23:09, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, can we agree that, as a whole, storms should abide by the existing notability criteria? Specifically, that a storm has significant, independent sources, meaning sources that originated outside of the warning center. --Hurricanehink (talk) 02:06, 7 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For recent storms, I can agree to that. For older storms, information can be hard to come by. Thegreatdr (talk) 15:14, 8 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, for older storms, they generally shouldn't have an article, if it only has a brief mention in one source. Hurricanehink (talk) 15:54, 8 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, I have gone through EPAC storms and I suppose Hurricane Liza (1968), Hurricane Douglas (2002), Tropical Storm Kay (2004), and Tropical Storm Beatriz (2005), Tropical Storm Norma (2005) could be merged. No offence, but some articles are listed are a little out of the book (just a little) and this article in particular bothered me. The storm killed 18 and the deadliest EPAC storm during the 2000-2009 period. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 00:16, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it's just a discussion to get the ball rolling. I think if Carlotta was in the Atlantic, it wouldn't be seen as important. There, 18 deaths is nothing. As the shipwreck doesn't have an article, I would prefer keeping the article. However, if that shipwreck article is ever created, then Carlotta doesn't need to exist. And actually, above, Carlotta 00 isn't mentioned. It's the 06 one, which had little effect on land. Hurricanehink (talk) 00:53, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Carlotta 00 is on Mitch's merge page. I also proposed the other Carlotta to be merged. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 01:26, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Hurricanehink; we should not merge/delete Carlotta (2000). However, if we ever create a serious article on the MV Linkuva, I would have no objections to a merger. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 01:35, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, I think we can merge ~~Chris 00~~ or Norma 05 next. Any thoughts? Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 04:15, 12 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Now, unless there is any objection for Norma to be merged ill merge it at at 5 UTC (12 ET). Then, we can get rid of Lidia 05. BTW, while we merge articles, we should also be focusing on what to improve or create a page on a land impacting cyclone. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 23:48, 13 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If people are still serious about this merging, Tropical Storm Omeka (2010) is a good candidate. The only way that storm establishes some sort of record is if you lump in the Eastern Pacific with the Central Pacific, which NHC (and likely CPHC) won't do, even if both basins share a common database. I think this project assessing Omeka to have established some record, which thus far has not been mentioned by a TCWC/RSMC, either means the record does not really exist, or it is just trivial. Thegreatdr (talk) 13:53, 21 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It does have a record. The best track file as the latest forming tropcial cyclone in the calender year. The CPHC database mentions two storms fomring later than Omeka. The MWR database mentions the latest EPAC storm pre-1929 storms forming in mid-December. Based on this, Omeka is the latest forming tropcial storm since 1904. Even if you think the record is trivia, Omeka is a rare off-season storm. As of this writing, we currently have articles for many Atlantic off-season storms, so why not do it for the EPAC. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 16:20, 21 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You're still not catching my point. If the North-central Pacific has seasons with no tropical cyclones, then there cannot be a record for latest storm in that basin, which means it is unlikely that CPHC will consider it a record themselves. I need you to come up with some sources which merge the Northeast Pacific with the North Central Pacific statswise. Just because NHC conveniently merges their stats into the same HURDAT file (and we conveniently merge them within this project) does not mean the CPHC and NHC merge those stats when it comes to any kind of record within their basins. I think we should wait for the storm report to come out in the next couple months to see if CPHC mentions this record before we do. It's safer that way, and avoids any OR issues. If you want Omeka to be notable, use its subtropical status in the Central Pacific as its basis. Check HURDAT...I'm sure you'll find very few STs in their database for the North-central Pacific. Thegreatdr (talk) 16:30, 21 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I can't find any way out of this. Either way, there is still going to be confusion. Splitting EPAC and CPAC into articles will not work as it will create stubs and could potentially hurt the quality of articles and thus the recent changes for the 2010 PHS will not work. Does anyone else have any comments about this? Getting back on topic, Omeka is still a notable storm for two reasons. The first is that its subtropical origin and the second is that Omeka formed in December. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 19:31, 21 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Just an update, Norma was deleted per its AFD. I'm not sure how much more outside of the project discussion is needed (the AFD didn't yield too much non-project discussion), but I'd like to note the closing nom's comment - "The result was delete. just an off topic comment to the close but surely the way to handle marginally/nn stiorms like this is a yearly list?" Basically, he agrees to keep the fish storms on the yearly list. ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 05:24, 30 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Per Norma and Beatriz's AFD, it seems that simply merging is an appropriate method. It's not like the information is actually getting deleted, just that it's being put in another location. Most of the time, the storm articles are bloated beyond belief, so when they are merged, no real info is being lost. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 21:19, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Deaths and damage, direct and indirect

I noticed something that's been bothering me. If a tropical cyclone is loosely related to an event (say, it was merged, and that system later caused impact), should that be in the original tropical cyclone's article? I'm not talking when it was one continuous cyclone, both tropical and extratropical (think Gordon 06, Charley 84). There are several examples I can think of that are questionable.

Hurricane Hortense (1984) - was absorbed by a cold front, which later caused 6 deaths in Europe. Should that be mentioned at all? Also, should that be in the infobox?
Tropical Storm Paul (2000) - dissipated, and later its associated moisture joined with an upper-level low to produce flooding in Hawaii.
Hurricane Noel (2001) - was absorbed by a larger extratropical low and caused heavy damage in Canada. If the focus of the article is on the Canadian impact, should the article be as "Noel" (which was only loosely related) or the extratropical storm?
Tropical Storm Laura (2008) - became extratropical, was absorbed by a cold front, and caused impact in Europe. If the impact is the only reason for the article, should it be as a TC article, or as a Europe flooding article?

I think we used to get in the habit that if something was loosely related to a tropical cyclone, it had to be in the tropical cyclone article. However, I think we need to get past that.

What do you all think? --Hurricanehink (talk) 05:04, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If a system is absorbed, I'd consider that information unnecessary because it hasn't been caused by the tropical cyclone, even in an indirect way. However, if a storm is still upstream and causing a flood event to the north (in the NH, south in the SH), then yes, its relevant. In that case, it's a PRE event. Thegreatdr (talk) 05:18, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Alright. I'll take this into practice with Hurricane Noel (2001) - an article I wrote. It was absorbed, so in theory all of the other information would be unnecessary. However, as that is the primary content of the article and what is notable, I'm going to move it to a better location. --Hurricanehink (talk) 05:50, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We discussed that with the TC whose moisture hit Yemen in 2008. Acttally it was never more than a tropical depression (neither by IMD nor by JTWC standards). As a storm this event was not notable. This should be a flood article not a storm article, see 2008 Yemen cyclone and it's moving history for details, as well as the relevant talk pages. But OTOH the moisture would not have been there without the cyclone. --Matthiasb (talk) 18:23, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, I think that is an example where it could be either, since it did make landfall but, as you said, it wasn't meteorologically significant at all. It wasn't named, so there was no good title for the storm. If we went by the standard of the article title is whatever the cyclone was called officially, it would be Deep Depression ARB 02, which doesn't help the reader at all. Calling it what the event really was ("2008 Yemen floods") is automatically so much more useful to the reader. --Hurricanehink (talk) 18:35, 6 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I personally think that "2008 Yemen Cyclone" is the most accurate title there - with "2008 Yemen floods" as a redirect to it. Since the cyclone was the direct cause of the floods. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 01:45, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What about other articles, where cyclones aren't the direct cause of the impact? Hurricanehink (talk) 03:51, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure, to be honest. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 03:56, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I moved Paul, and I think it works much better as a simple flood article. Hurricanehink (talk) 18:47, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

All of the articles have been moved, except for Laura 08. What should we do about Atlantic tropical cyclones that are absorbed, and then that system causes impact? Laura isn't the only one, although it's a convenient case. As a tropical cyclone it didn't do much, and the "impact" in the article wasn't related to Laura. Another example is Hurricane Maria (2005). Aside from its tropical impact in the US, as well as its legitimate extratropical impact in Iceland and Scotland, it largely focuses on what it did in Norway, specifically the Hatlestad Slide. To sum up my confusion with a potentially confusing question, to what degree should TC articles be focusing on what they didn't do as TC's? --Hurricanehink (talk) 17:57, 14 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If the storm itself had no impact on land other than the flood caused the remnant's of the system, then it should be a flood article. Tropical Storm Norma (1970) should be re-titled 1970 Arizona floods, but Hurricane Paine (1986) should not be re-titled 1986 Oklahoma floods. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 23:04, 14 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yea, that would be a good clarifier, whether it caused any actual impact as a tropical cyclone. If not then it should be reformatted. Ultimately, that would affect:

Tropical Storm Norma (1970) - moisture fueled by an upper level, retitle 1970 Arizona floods?
Tropical Storm Laura (2008) - absorbed by extratropical storm that caused impact, although University of Berlin called it ex-Laura
Hurricane Debbie (1961) - was extratropical when causing impact in Europe, although it was a long time ago
Hurricane Octave (1989) - remnants caused rainfall impact
Tropical Storm Ignacio (1997) - same as above
2000 October subtropical storm - absorbed by larger extratropical storm that caused impact, should probably be retitled - October 2000 Atlantic Canada storm complex?
Tropical Depression Nine (2003) - precursor tropical wave caused rainfall, and it dissipated before producing light rainfall over Puerto Rico and Hispaniola
Tropical Storm Delta (2005) - became extratropical before affecting Canary Islands and Morocco
Tropical Storm Fabio (2006) - similar to Tropical Storm Paul (2000) (albeit much less severely), dissipated and had its remnant moisture influenced by an upper-level low - however, flooding was fairly minor
Tropical Depression Five (2010) - precursor caused rainfall over Florida, and it was no longer a tropical cyclone when it spread rainfall across SE US; however, it was a continuous LPA

I'm excluding Hurricane Lili (1984) (only in the sense of its only impact was caused by its remnants, but it's primarily MH), Hurricane Jeanne (1998) (similar to Lili), Tropical Storm Cristobal (2002) (merge instead since it did nothing as tropical?), Hurricane Karl (2004) (similar to Jeanne), Tropical Storm Ingrid (2007) (merge candidate), Tropical Depression Fifteen (2007) (similar to Karl), and Tropical Storm Ana (2009) (operationally thought to be TC when impact occurred), since none could be standalone articles if they were reformatted to emphasize what their remnant was. Tropical Storm Chantal (2007) had both precursor and extratropical impact, but none as a TC, so I just thought I'd mention it. Likewise, in the EPAC, I excluded Tropical Storm Zeke (1992) and Hurricane Bud (2006), since they couldn't be standalone based on their remnant impact.

Now, I should question - what about precursors?

Tropical Storm Isabel (1985) - precursor caused very heavy rainfall and flooding in Puerto Rico, next to no tropical impact - move to October 1985 Puerto Rico floods?
Tropical Storm Leslie (2000) - similar to above, causing heavy rainfall in Miami area and little elsewhere - move to October 2000 South Florida floods?
Tropical Storm Andrew (1986) - unlike the above, which formed shortly after the flooding happened, Andrew formed several days after it - move to June 1986 Jamaica floods?
Tropical Storm Grace (1997) - similar to Leslie, developed as an extratropical storm just north of Puerto Rico, then transitioned - move to October 1997 Puerto Rico floods?

Hurricanehink (talk) 00:06, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Dont forget that if a tropical storm is absorbed by an extratropical cyclone on its way to Europe. Then the extratropical cyclone will probably have a name assigned to it by the University of Berlin and would become an European windstorm and thus any impact would be noted in an EWS article.Jason Rees (talk) 00:39, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I do not think Octave 89 should not be listed. The storm itself started to impact land as a dissipating tropical cyclone. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 02:55, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the article doesn't say that, that's only why I included it. Hurricanehink (talk) 04:02, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I also think, it should be a TC article if its remnant entirely contributed to a flood/windstorm. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 04:39, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

But we know that's rarely the case. Even extratropical storms aren't entirely related to the storm - they're often attached to fronts that give it an extra boost of energy. Likewise, for remnants, most of the time there is something that is moving/influencing that remnant moisture. I went ahead and clarified the above ones that were questionable, likewise with the precursor ones. Comments would be useful. I just think that some of the articles are improperly focused. Hurricanehink (talk) 05:44, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I do not think Ignacio, Octave, and TD 5 should be moved. There remnants were related to the flood unlike others. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 15:10, 15 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Does anyone else have any thoughts? For the postcursor impact ones, the ones that are most affected are Fabio 06 (impact is just remnant rain in Hawaii, and would not support article) and TD 9 03 (impact is just remnant rain in Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic, probably would not support article). For the precursor impact ones, they're all fairly borderline, being called TC articles when they're all (with possible exception of Grace 97) better known as just flooding events. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 04:41, 27 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This needs to stop...

Near as I can tell, since the beginning of December, one storm article has been created: 1898 Georgia hurricane. Eleven, on the other hand, have been blanked and redirected elsewhere. These numbers equate to the addition of 869 words of content and the deletion of 6,217. Seven of the articles voided were good articles. Some have been in existence for up to five years and never subjected to any formal, site-wide consensual evaluation process. In some cases, content from the deleted articles has been merged into another article without proper attribution (ie., they're copyright violations), leading to blatant issues with undue weight. In List of storms in the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, for example, TS Lee's section is exactly as long as Emily's, a Category 5 hurricane that inflicted nearly $1 billion in damages. Are the two storms really equally significant? Further, there is often little or no justification for the deletion of the articles. Tropical Storm Alex (1998) was blanked, for example, with the edit summary "merging"; nothing in terms of basis in policy or community voice is established. In other cases still, on the talk page for Hurricane Cindy '99, objecting editors are horrifically and deliberately misinterpreted and then referenced by supporters of its deletion. Judging by this conveniently unadvertised list, there are up to 100 more articles in line for this improper treatment. Cucurbitaceae (talk) 20:54, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Just asking a question here, and I do not mean to be rude, but why are you making such a big deal out of it? TropicalAnalystwx13 (talk) 21:12, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That was a pointless question which I don't feel the need to dignify with a response. Cucurbitaceae (talk) 21:16, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

While I agree we merge too many articles, some of these articles fail WP:N. If you read the talk page, there is currently a notability discussion on. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 22:51, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

...which is why I didn't say they should be reversed. It was just some food for thought going forward. Cucurbitaceae (talk) 23:00, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I agree with you; I'm very concerned with and completely opposed to the direction the project is taking with the removal/redirection/listification of these articles. IMHO, there should be an article, if even a stub, on every named/verified storm, as, also IMHO, the fact of being a tropical system of stronger than depression strength is de facto notability. Unfortunatly, it seems 'consensus' is for the removal of good, verifiable, notable information instead. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 23:17, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Generally, the content is getting moved someplace else. The problem is these articles fail WP:N. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 23:42, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've been with the project 5 years, and I and several other editors have had issues with the number of articles on storms that have done absolutely nothing in their existence. If you have an issue with the way things are going now, you should've seen three years ago, where this mass creation was beginning to cause problems. Most of us with the project for a long time just want to start cleaning up this mess. I used to be a inclusionist, but now I've gone wildly moderate and want some line to be drawn. Articles are coming out of the crapper and we need to stop it before the reputation of the project drops. Cucurbitaceae, judging by your treatment of TA13, you're borderline pushing WP:CIVIL and shouldn't be giving him grief for asking a question. The sandbox that I made 25 days ago was made to be a forever silent userspace page, not that I ever expected it to be made public. Someone that night made it public and at that point it was out of my hands. If you think I had something to do with ever being made public, I don't think its a fair accusation. If you've noticed, I've only edited it once since I made the original list of 94 storms.Mitch32^{(Transportation Historian)} 23:59, 17 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have been here as long as I have, but I'll be blunt: TA's answer was much more closer to incivility than anything Cucurbitaceae wrote. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 04:57, 20 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As a member emeritus of this little group, my stance was - and remains - we should only make an article if the content supports one. A category one fishspinner is usually not inherently notable enough for an independent article. That's generally how things work on Wikipedia; when a topic outgrows its "parent" page, you split it off into a new article. Now, if there are procedural or consensus issues, that's fine, but what they're doing doesn't appear to be inherently bad, and I think I disagree fundamentally with merging a GA without obtaining consensus first. But I don't know what's actually happened; I just popped in to comment on this thread, I have no clue what the actual motions are. --Golbez (talk) 00:17, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Look at how many articles were created in October and November... none (other than active storms). There were actually two new articles this month (1898 Georgia and 1868 Atlantic hurricane season) and a recently upgraded FL this month, which is more activity than in months. You can't compare one article being created versus how many articles are merged. The ones that are being merged are storms that affected no one and don't really pass the notability criteria (no content outside of the warning center means there is a lack of significant independent sources, as required by WP:NOTABLE). When you look at the articles that are being merged, they were all bloated to make it look like it was long enough. When they were merged, it wasn't really copyright violations as the info was condensed (and getting rid of the redundancies so common in the low-notability storm articles). Furthermore, you can't really call there being an undue weight in season article. Technically, they were all one of X storms in the season article, so the fact that Erick has a similar section length to Emily isn't terribly problematic. If they were properly weighted, then Katrina's section would be 1,000 times longer than Arlene's, as it caused 1,000 times the deaths and 8,000 times the damage. Surely you wouldn't want that! --Hurricanehink (talk) 00:35, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, if you're distraught at the lack of articles being created, there are plenty of storms that still need articles! Check out Wikipedia:WikiProject Tropical cyclones/Article requests. Of note, there are several storms that killed over 100 people in need of an article. --Hurricanehink (talk) 00:52, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I am currently creating an article. I think we are merging without discussion a little too much. For example Hurricane Waldo (1985) was merged when I was not even finished writing it. However, most of the articles recently the have been merged fail WP:N. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 02:57, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well, most articles have a discussion before they are merged. Waldo was merged because it was poorly written and short, and not to mention there was little damage. I apologize for not doing a discussion in that instance- I will refrain from doing that in the future. --Hurricanehink (talk) 04:26, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Good, Ill be happy as long as if they started a discussion. BTW, I think we should focus on article improvement/creation once the mass deletion is finished. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 04:38, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That should always be the focus. The season articles need to most work. Thegreatdr (talk) 10:41, 18 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I took a break from editing anything here due to school, and when I return I see what is frankly, a ridiculous mess. The recent merging spree ignores the reason many of those articles were created: Undue weight concerns involving season articles. While it can be argued that some articles could be better handled by improving the relevant section of a season article, there are articles, such as Lee 2005, in which merging introduced undue weight and summary style concerns, so we are worse off than what we started. Many of these articles were essentially "finished" (for lack of a better term) and needed no further work for the foreseeable future, and their maintenance cost is practically zero. Now all effort placed in improving those articles is for naught, and their information is lost. I should not have to explain why this discourages editor participation in this area of content that desperately needs new contributors.
As for Cindy 1999: I saw nowhere where Cyclonebiskit consented to the merge, even though it was presented as a fact; and the way that IRC channel discussions were mentioned as a justification for that merge makes me rather suspicious that the consensus was forged there (or CB pressured to not say anything), in explicit violation of channel rules (and makes the consensus flawed in my view). Also, I disagree with the whole "bloated text" argument there, so I personally oppose the merge. For all those reasons, I reverted the merge under WP:BRD. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 05:16, 20 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
- As I said before (I think), it's debatable about the undue weight concern. As the season article is just the culmination of the individual storms, the weight isn't terribly undue if there is a sub-article. At least, that is my opinion. As for whether they were finished, I would disagree. I noticed a lot of the supposed "good" articles weren't written that well, notably with their levels of redundancy. As DR said, what's more important is the season articles, and oftentimes the section for the merged article was in terribly shape (short, missing details). As for Cindy, no, IRC wasn't used, and only one editor (wrongly) thought another user agreed with the merge. There was no significant opposition, and given the article was just a meteorological history (no one affected, and everything from the NHC), it wasn't really that notable.
- However, I see your main point isn't so much on why they were merged, but rather how the consensus was determined. I can see one being annoyed how non-project members weren't really consulted. I just figured we knew best as we're so familiar with the storms, but that's not really an answer. What do you think is the solution to go from here? ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 06:56, 20 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  - Well, again, we should post this in a place that is really visible. (RFCs are not visible, unless they're user conduct RFCs, in which case they are visible only because there is a pitchfork-wielding crowd getting ready to crush a luser.) Since the main crux of the argument is that there is an impetus to declare that these articles do not merit a full article in Wikipedia based on evaluation of notability, these are, in practice, deletion discussions and fully belong under the purview of the Articles for deletion process. (Merging discussions do not prohibit the subsequent expansion of articles post-discussion, and it appears that this is a goal of this merging drive, which push these even farther away from nominal merge discussions.)
  - Furthermore, this is a direct parallel of the epic Pokémon deletion debates (cf. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bulbasaur (3rd nomination)): The articles were not "deleted", per se, since Wikipedia retains a smidge of information about each species in several list articles (which are roughly equivalent to our season articles). Yet, that consensus was forged in VFD/AFD based on broad consultation with the entire Wikipedia community.
  - To summarize: My main point is that I reject the assertion that WPTC editors know better than the rest of the community based on familiarity with the storms. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 23:11, 20 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

We could have a discussion on here. That way more people could see the discussion, as very few people have Norma 05 or Otto 04 watchlisted. It should also be noted that Peter and Mindy were merged without discussion, and their merger got me angry. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 15:51, 20 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No. WikiProject consultation is not sufficient. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 23:11, 20 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tropical Storm Norma (2005) - I nominated an article for deletion, so we can get some input from outside editors. ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 18:44, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If only one tenth of the words lost in this discussion and related to this, above would have been used to improve articles that would have been a step foreward. This discussion leads to nothing. And so the issues with 2009-10 08U still are remaining as well as Cyclone Phet is still a ~~start class~~ bad article. It's pretty inefficient to discuss merging of GA class articles as long as a bunch of quite important articles like Phet are suboptimal. Worse, a lot of meteorological articles are subobtimal, f. ex. though not in the scope of this project, the article blizzard is a cup of unreferrenced rubbish, and another problem in a meteorological article, some time line issues addressed here have not been fixed in 2006 Westchester County tornado two months later. --Matthiasb (talk) 19:36, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, I am going to AFD Tropical Storm Beatriz (2005) later tonight. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 04:39, 28 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I just got back in the full swing of Wikipedaing after the holidays, sorry I didn't get around to replying to this sooner. So, the claim is all these articles "fail WP:N"? How? They're verifiable, using reliable sources. Even if they don't hit land, it's my firm belief that a named tropical system is notable because it is a named tropical system - note that, at WikiProject Aircraft, for instance, an aircraft is deemed notable by being a distinct type of aircraft; it doesn't have to have had any impact on the aviation world; for that matter, it doesn't even have to fly! As noted above, a lot of these articles that are proposed for/have been merged are/were Good Articles. If they were truly non-notable, they wouldn't have become GAs in the first place; furthermore, what good does deleting/merging them do? Is Wikipedia running low on hard disk space in their server farms? I don't belive so. Are the articles the kind of article that would make somebody go "lawl, good ol' unreliable Wikipedia!" upon seeing them? Since they're GA's, I don't think so. In which case...the only argument I can really see for getting rid of them is the fact that some editors don't think they should exist, and therefore use a borderline WP:N argument as the club with which to smack them off of the encyclopedia. Wikipedia is not paper; the continued deletion of decent, reasonable, verifable content, here and elsewhere, becasue "it's not notable" is leading me to conclude that Wikipedia just, might, be broken, but it's not in the way so many people claim ("look at all the crap!"); rather, it's broken because people are trying too hard to make Wikipedia just like a paper encyclopedia, and thus tossing a whole orphanage's worth of babies out with the dirty bath water. If WPTC's consensus is that the tossing is both desirable and necessary, I'm afraid the project and myself have irreconciable differences. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 22:22, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The argument people are using to back up their argument that the Storms fail WP:N as they do not contain secondary sources that are not just a rewrite of the advisory. There is not any question of them not liking them its just called commonsense not to have an article on a named storm that lasted for six hours and caused no impact.Jason Rees (talk) 23:41, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This is a tough call, but I think WP:N makes the deciding argument. Every Simpson episode has an articles often have multiple references from a few different sources. However, I do not think many fishspinner tropical cyclones have references outside the NHC. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 02:40, 8 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Not to mention, so many more people know of the Simpsons as a whole than individual storms (sans the biggies). --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 05:10, 8 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Possible FAC run as a project?

This is a good point, but there's nothing preventing any of us from contributing to both this conversation and article improvement. I believe a few of us who have commented also have articles at GAN (so we are being productive in some manner.) Over the years, I have not received much help with the meteorology articles, with the big exceptions of extratropical cyclone and tropical cyclone which was pretty far along when I got to it. With urban heat island I had to tip-toe through the climate briar patch, but all turned out well. Several editors are engaged in the climate articles, but a couple have expressed no interest in changing them into a format that will pass through GAN/FAC as those processed are flawed, which is a fair point. Sometimes someone improves an article like Wildfire all on their own, but that's a once or twice a year thing. I just don't expect help within the met project anymore. Somehow it's not sexy to improve actual encyclopedaic articles within the various met projects, just the storm or occasionally the overarching yearly/seasonal articles. Thegreatdr (talk) 20:01, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. This discussion is not doing anything productive, and instead we could be building articles. When was the last time we got an article to FA? We have not have an impressive FA run (we had a few GA runs, though) since I have been here. Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 22:08, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The last time many of us in the project were involved in the same FAC was for tropical cyclone, and we went through three of them. FAC is a draining process, so I can understand the unwillingness to go through it alone but once or twice a year. Which article important to the project do you think we could all contribute towards for a FAC run? We tried to get Hurricane Camille to GA a couple years ago, as a group (3 or 4 of us), and while the article improved, it didn't get close to a GAN run. Thegreatdr (talk) 22:12, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Numerical weather prediction is pretty meh (barely any history, no mention of different approaches through the years such as barotropic/baroclinic multi-layer/primitive equation models), and could get a nice touchup. I can work on something like that during the break. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 22:40, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've dabbled with editing that article over the past few years, and have only managed 22 edits. If others were willing to work on it, I'd take another stab at it. Thegreatdr (talk) 22:50, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Does anyone have any comments about this FA/GA run? I think we should start this run very soon (when the wikicup starts). Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 17:30, 31 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Tito and I are well underway on this article's improvement. It's finally well referenced, so a GAN run is just a matter of when we think it has sufficient content. Thegreatdr (talk) 01:13, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, I have two articles that i'd like to get to GA, Tropical Storm Lidia (1981), and Hurricane Norma (1981). Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 01:19, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

HURDAT Updates

Hello all,

I sent an email to Chris Landsea a few months ago (around the time of the document with the 1940's and 1950's HURDAT updates). He responded today and said that 1926-1930 Atlantic HURDAT data will be released next week to the public and that the 1930's will be completed by the end of 2011.

— Iune (talk) 22:30, 28 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Aww, that's too bad the 1940/1950 HURDAT won't be updated. That is where the good stuff is! 1926-30 is pretty blah. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 00:57, 29 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've gotten an updated email and it says for the years 1944-1953, the following changes were submitted...

21 new tropical storms and hurricanes are recommended to be added to HURDAT;
The number of major hurricanes is suggested to be significantly reduced from an average of 3.6 to 2.7 per year during this decade(this reduction is due to the removal of a known high bias in the winds during this era);
A large number of central pressure measurements have been rediscovered. If included into HURDAT, this would increase this observations from 92 up to 301 during this decade;
One new US hurricane (1953 Hazel) is suggested to be added into HURDAT and one is recommended to be removed (1953 Carol);
Six US hurricanes are recommended to be upgraded by a Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Windscale Category and one US hurricane is suggested to be downgraded a Category;
A separate study analyzed how the 10 most recent Category 5 hurricanes would have been represented in the HURDAT of the late 1940s.

— Iune (talk) 17:45, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Here's the PDF: [1] — Iune (talk) 17:49, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User:Iune/HURDATChanges

Fort Lauderdale (1947) downgraded to a category 4
Hurricane Dog (1950) and Hurricane Easy (1951) downgraded to category 4
Mike (1950) was a 40 knot TS in October
Carol (1953) upgraded to a category 5
A January Tropical Storm formed on 1/2 in 1951

— Iune (talk) 19:01, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Just as a note, nothing between 1944 and 1953 is official yet. It has to be reviewed by the Best Track committee first. Cyclonebiskit (talk) 20:14, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- ...and that could take a while. I'm guessing a few years. It's good to know it is there. If any of the provisional data is thrown in the relevant hurricane seasons/storm articles, it will need to have the provisional wording. I went through the first 20 pages of the document today at work, and was pleased it had some ROCI/POI/RMW data in it for those older storms. Does anyone know if the provisional 1926-1943 information is online anywhere? Thegreatdr (talk) 21:47, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  - 1926 to 1930 is on HURDAT and is in the process of being integrated in the articles. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 23:48, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

New Tropical Cyclone Collaboration of the Fortnight: Numerical weather prediction

Since we have been discussing a project-wide FAC run above, lets make it formal. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 19:45, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Please nominate and help select more articles for the next time at Wikipedia:WikiProject Tropical cyclones/Collaboration.

Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 19:45, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Tropical cyclones in 2005

Well, I made it. I really feel like there should be an overarching article for all of the seasons. I opted to make it a dab, with mentions of any retired storms, as well as the strongest storm if it had an article. Feel free to scrutinize, but I feel it had to be done. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 05:07, 8 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thoughts/comments/complaints? --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 04:39, 9 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

What you have is fine with me. It's probably best to have it as a list-like/disambiguation page, since the seasons are all already covered. How much repetition/sources of possible content change do we really need within this project anyway? =) Thegreatdr (talk) 13:27, 9 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Haha, yea, well, we really should have some top-level season article. I don't think we could go any higher than "Tropical cyclones in 2005"! --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 16:11, 9 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Strongest North indian ocean cyclone

According to the sea level pressure, Typhoon Gay (1989) is the strongest cyclone in the north indian ocean but on wikipedia and other websites its 1999 Orissa cyclone which had a sea level pressure of 912hpa compared to that of Gay which is 898hpa.. This typhoon is not even mentioned in the intense cyclone list as well.. though it was small but I think its the strongest in NIO region...HunterZone (talk) 12:44, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

We use the official Regional Specialized Meteorological Center, RSMC New Delhi (India Meteorological Department) and they reported that the Orissa cyclone was stronger than Gay. — Iune (talk) 19:30, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yea, the pressure estimate for Gay is unofficial. There is no estimate from the IMD, so officially the Orissa cyclone is still the strongest. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 16:51, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Objective plan looking forward

Given the nature of the discussions on this page during the past several weeks, it seems clear to me that this WikiProject needs an objective, clear, and reasonable plan for improving and refining content moving forward. Efforts by individual users seem highly disjointed, and I believe they should be largely focused toward a mutual goal, such as making a particular series of articles more seamless. Merging more obscure TC articles into their respective season pages seems to be the common theme, and aside from my objections to this movement expressed above, I believe that as a component of project reform, this method of refining content does little to further said reform. Most TC season articles are dreadfully underdeveloped, neglecting a majority of potential information or otherwise lacking in quality. Merging a GA-quality article into it leaves the season no better off than it was previously. And if we are to work on serious, sweeping reforms, season articles should be among the top priorities, because they serve as starting points for TC history-related research.

Our top-level articles are generally of decent quality and completeness; tropical cyclone being a featured article certainly helps the cause. Articles such as Tropical cyclone naming, Tropical cyclogenesis, Tropical cyclone scales, and Tropical cyclone rainfall climatology are more-or-less comprehensive, and the project has done a very respectable job developing a base of basic meteorology articles. No other resource in the world to my knowledge has such detailed overview articles of the process that drive, methods that help to forecast, and broad effects of tropical cyclones. The next step is to create and strengthen relationships between these overarching articles and specific historical accounts, starting with season articles and working down to individual storm articles, and finally deciding how to proceed with daughter articles from there.

I believe season articles have yet to so much as approach their full potential. Ideally, every year of every basin's officially recorded seasonal TC activity should be documented somewhere. In some regions, such as the southern Pacific and Australian basins, it might be hard to have year-by-year pages with sufficient content, so perhaps decadal or even multi-basin articles could be made more common. Another important question is what format to use when writing modern season articles, where an abundance of information exists. The 2003 Atlantic hurricane season article employs a summary style in which each storm is dedicated a few sentences to a paragraph of heavily abridged meteorological information, and a general season impact section is appended to the bottom of the article. I prefer this format as opposed to the list-like style of 2000 Atlantic hurricane season, but either way, I'm not fond of having such vastly different formats occur within the same decade in the same basin.

As for the storm articles, the most important step would be to decide upon which class/group of cyclones are notable enough to sustain a stand-alone article. Standards have obviously tightened in the past year or so, with minimal impact storms receiving fewer articles. A decent storm article has enough information to at least balance out its meteorological chronology with its description of land-based impacts. Generally, if a storm had minor or no impacts, alternative methods of covering it should be brought into account.

With that said, one of my greatest concerns is sub-articles of storm pages, such as Effects of Hurricane Charley in South Carolina or Meteorological history of Hurricane Dean. In general, sub-articles are created when the main article approaches or exceeds Wikipedia's size limits or if concerns about the nature of the content arise – particularly involving undue weight toward a particular aspect of the topic. An example of where sub-articles are properly and practically used is Hurricane Dean, which covers an extremely notable and widespread storm. It fairly provides each main region of impact with a summary section and a sub-article. However, for Hurricane Charley, even if its sub-articles on SC and NC were condensed and merged into the main article, it would probably not even approach maximum size limits, so I think the justification for having those sub-articles is weak and atypical at best.

Thoughts would be appreciated. Cucurbitaceae (talk) 00:42, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I agree in principle that the project should concentrate on the met and season articles. One big issue is that most people don't feel qualified to edit the met articles, which is why it is normally left to a (very) few of us to work on. The season articles are easiest to do for the Atlantic (one main source of info), and most difficult/time-consuming for the western Pacific (several main sources of info). That being said, the project can't force individuals to edit/improve articles they don't want to improve. Storm articles are the easiest articles to improve to GA status, which is probably why people are attracted to working on them. For those that do, consider improving that storm's section within its season's article, using the appropriate referencing. Per the section above, we do need to decide as a project what to do about tropical depressions (project-wide, not basin-by-basin) for the sake of seasonal articles. Thegreatdr (talk) 14:34, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Your point reminds me of something I said a long time ago: Telling others how to stop wasting their time is a good way to waste yours. Unfortunately, it seems the project as a whole has been doing the corollary of that, with many discussions which try to cajole members into using their time in ways that they don't necessarily find appealing or rewarding. As such, now there is a backlash against articles perceived as "useless", even when their maintenance cost is minimal.

That said, I don't think that WPTC even knows what its members are interested in, and which are their areas of expertise, so any attempts at collaboration do not cater to the project members' skills in an optimal matter. I think that first we have to figure out collectively what we like to do and figure out how to improve the article base from there. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 19:43, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the "project" is now at the stage where we should be focusing more on the end game. The past five years has been about developing the project, trying different things and whatnot. Now that we've tried different things, we should focus on how things should ultimately end up. As for season articles, I personally hate how there are two types of the same article (old style and new style), when they both cover the same content. Likewise, having too many sub-sections for a retired storm leads to similar redundancy, turning the main article into a glorified dab. Look at Hurricane Isabel. Some of the sub-sections are certainly redundant.

It seems that, myself at least, we got focused on including as much as possible for making storm articles. With the Isabel topic (which I admit I made and went overboard), there is such detail in a state sub-article that it gets down to almost including damage to each house, every flooded car, etc. Sometimes, it seems that just because it has a name, it is more important, but if a cold front did the same thing, people would be scratching their heads why we have so much detail. As for season articles, I'm gradually working on them. Both 1950 and 1951 AHS's are up for good topic, and I'm working my way forward. As with the sub-articles vs. the big storm articles, and as with the minor storm articles vs the season articles, we all feel it is easier to focus on something as specific as possible. We just feel like we're doing more work when we write a five paragraph storm article vs. a two paragraph section in the season article with the same info. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 16:23, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also, another thought, but should we really be devoting such effort to the state hurricane articles? Finishing List of Pennsylvania hurricanes would take an absurd amount of effort, and yet essentially it's just a prose version of a theoretical complete Category:Pennsylvania hurricanes. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 18:44, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You could treat it one of two different ways. Either only talk about systems which brought hurricane-force winds to PA, or give top 10 lists for various variables, like we did for the Philippines. Thegreatdr (talk) 19:08, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You could, again, start with the easy ones, like this one. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 19:34, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I do very much like how the Philippines one worked out. In a way, it is similar to how List of Florida hurricanes is (the main page). It wouldn't work too well for a landlocked state like PA. Even Arizona, should it cover every last storm that impacted the state? IMO that borders WP:NOT, that it shouldn't be "lists or repositories of loosely associated topics". Yes, I think a lot of time was wasted (my own) for meticulously including every known impacting storm in a certain area. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 19:40, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The season articles could use some of that meticulousness. hehehehe Thegreatdr (talk) 21:24, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

So, we sort of got off the ball on this, a plan looking forward. Specifically, there is still the lack of consistency among season articles, and then we have the issue of the state articles. For the latter one, is it even encyclopediac to try and list every storm to affect a single state? --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 16:13, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

No, it's not. I've been waiting for the project to try to incorporate the "Is this article something you might find in an encyclopedia" thought into article creation and expansion. Encyclopedias would use a summary style, and likely only mention the top few events either by damage or by how it changed history within that state (which can and does happen), covering all the others with general statistics such as "Alaska gets impacted by 12 former Pacific typhoons annually," instead of naming every single impact. Thegreatdr (talk) 15:46, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

New vs. Old season articles

Starting a separate section, I feel we really need to decide about the new vs. old format, and I have a proposal. It came up in the 2008 AHS, when so many storms were impacting Hispaniola, and the article wasn't really reflecting it. I propose that we use a combination of the formats. Have a section by section listing for each storm's meteorological history, followed by a section on the season's impact (like this). That way, there can be proper focus on areas that are affected more severely. For example, the 2004 season's effects in Florida. That should certainly have its own section. Another advantage is that all storms are treated equally, in that "fish storms" still get their own section, right next to a landfalling hurricane. Any thoughts? --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 02:20, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I like the idea. If you focus the Storms section to be an old-style, infoboxed storm listing, then all you would need to do to "complete" the season article would be to write the season impact at the end. (Or before?) Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 03:12, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Two questions come to mind. Would easy section still have a full impact section? And a separate but more important one, what would we do with the current redundancy in formats? --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 03:14, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

If you mean whether the storm subsections would have an impact section, I would say that they would have it to the same extent a storm subarticle has impact in its lede. That is, don't go into detail, but mention in broad general terms what happened. The detail should go in the season article's impact section. As for the current articles, don't worry about them yet. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 04:49, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds quite a change. I am opposed to this change for 2 reasons:

(1) what we would we do for EPAC articles if only one storm affected land?
(2) what would we do about the List of storms in X hurricane seasons?

Y E ^Tropical ^Cyclone 05:40, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

First, my proposal is an alternative to the old style. That still works fine for the seasons with few storms/little impact (particularly old AHS ones). It combines elements of the new and old, but still allows the best of both so there is only one article. As for the other thing, that can be discussed later. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 05:45, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to see a mockup of the proposal. How about doing it with 2010 Atlantic hurricane season? Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 09:39, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That would be nice to see. I can kind of see what is being proposed, but without an example, it's hard to know exactly what it would look like. Some of us need a picture before we can agree or disagree. Thegreatdr (talk) 10:57, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I like this idea. A hurricane season is defined partially by its meteorological chronology and partially by its impact, and usually, these interests do not coincide. If we could keep them separate and still provide an easy-to-navigate account of all storms, that would be ideal. Cucurbitaceae (talk) 23:21, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well, here is the section that I'm starting to work on. It's taking a bit of time, especially since most of the sections didn't have any impact in them at all. Hopefully you can tell where it's going. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 04:58, 16 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone have any thoughts on that? --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 02:42, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I like it. If we could put a picture that would be awesome. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 18:57, 23 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox hurricane small

I was thinking earlier that on the infobox hurricane small we have two bars outside the NHEM NHC AOR, one for the SSHS and one for the RSMC Centers scale. Both are usually followed by an abbreviation (SSHS or the RSMC/TCWCs initials). For the Australian/Southern Pacific regions id like to make it default for all infobox hurricane smalls to have (Aus) instead of the RSMC/TCWC initials. The reasons for this are one it would save us having to code PNG NWS or whichever warning center into the infobox and it would be better imo than the RSMC/TCWC initials. I raised this on the IRC Channel and reaction was generally favourable so i thought id bring it here.Jason Rees (talk) 04:35, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

template:Retired Atlantic hurricanes assessment

{{Retired Atlantic hurricanes assessment}} has been nominated for deletion. 65.93.14.196 (talk) 04:58, 16 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion for renaming the categories of tornadoes and hurricanes in the United States by state

Feel free to participate in Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2011 January 17#Tornadoes and hurricanes in the United States by state. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 05:42, 18 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Season effects table...again

Moving the discussion back to here, list arguments for and against below. Cyclonebiskit (talk) 01:41, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I would say there is hardly a controversy over the season effects table, per your edit summary. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 01:58, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You missed the explosion on IRC. This is [was] my attempt at moving it here, but apparently no one else feels too strongly either way about it to move their comments here. Cyclonebiskit (talk) 02:01, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, well, I do like the table in the 2010 AHS, as well as other random articles. First of all, it's sortable, which the previous one was sorely lacking. The new table also solves the issue of direct hit (which I removed earlier today which weren't referenced by TCR) by having a broad list of areas affected, which I totally support (since the impact is based on overall damage, not for a particular area). One concern of mine, that we have to address, is to what detail we list the areas affected. I'm thinking it should/is based off what's in the Infobox, but that isn't standardized either. If a hurricane hit Florida, but also brought rainfall to the southeastern United States, say killing one person in Georgia, what should it list? IMO, landfalls should be given some weight if they are notable, so I would prefer seeing Southeastern United States (Florida landfall). So, to clarify, whatever broad region it affects, as well as landfalls. --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 02:22, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Why shouldnt we have the areas affected template within the NHC AOR (CB)? you just seem to be objecting to them being added to the NHC AOR and not other basins. Some of the reasons why we should have it in the NHC AOR is that we confuse the reader when we use the current template for landfalls, as we list deaths and damages within the EPAC even though a system has not made landfall. Also these SE charts allow us to meet criteria like WP:Accessibility as Screen readers can they are able to be read easily by Screen readers.Jason Rees (talk) 15:38, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not objecting at all to its use in the Atlantic, I fully agree with it! --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 16:21, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I didnt mean you i meant Cyclonebiskit who is the one who opened this conversation.Jason Rees (talk) 16:25, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, you kept saying you right below my comment... --♫ Hurricanehink (talk) 16:36, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]