Jump to content

User talk:The Grid/Archive 4

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Archive 1Archive 2Archive 3Archive 4Archive 5Archive 6→Archive 10

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #14

Number 14, March 1, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of February 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Cyclone Ivan
Cyclone Ivan

Cyclone Ivan formed on February 7 and subsequently executed a loop to the west-southwest. Encountering favorable conditions, it strengthened to attain peak winds on February 17 before striking northeastern Madagascar. It degenerated into a remnant low pressure area as it crossed the island, and briefly re-organized into a weak tropical depression before dissipating on February 22. Ivan caused heavy damage in Madagascar, leaving 190,000 people homeless and causing over 83 deaths.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • In the South Pacific ocean, Cyclone Gene persisted from the previous month; a tropical depression also occurred in the month.
  • Tropical Cyclone Nicholas was the only named storm during the month in the Australian region, which struck Western Australia. Two tropical lows occurred during the month, the latter of which later formed into Tropical Cyclone Ophelia.
  • Four storms occurred in the Southwest Indian Ocean, including two from the previous month and the aforementioned Cyclone Ivan. Cyclone Hondo became the strongest cyclone worldwide in the month, and after becoming extratropical it regenerated over ten days later about 1750 miles (2800 km) to its west-northwest.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The February member of the month is RattleMan, for his lasting dedication and continual support of the project. During February, the user worked on improving the timeline articles for the previous season. RattleMan often updates the sections on storms in season articles, and helps to maintain the southern hemisphere articles.

Main Page content

Storm article statistics

Grade Nov Dec Jan Feb
FA 31 33 33 36
A 8 9 9 8
GA 109 112 114 123
B 82 86 99 96
Start 211 208 214 216
Stub 6 6 3 6
Total 447 454 472 485
ω 3.01 2.98 2.98 2.96
percentage
Less than B 		48.5 47.1 46.0 45.8
percentage
GA or better 		33.1 33.9 33.1 34.3

Improvements During the month, a total of 15 new articles were added, though the net increase in start or stub articles was only three. The highest quality set of articles for a basin is for the Eastern Pacific Ocean, of which half of its articles are either a good article or better; all of its retired storm articles are good or better. However, the basin has a lower total number of articles, and the Atlantic basin has a higher overall total of good articles.

There is a drive to increase the number of featured topics, which is located on the project talk page.

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 05:01, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

March 2008

Welcome to Wikipedia. I notice that you removed explicit content from Gorillaz. However, Wikipedia is not censored to remove profanity or pornography. Please do not remove or censor information that is relevant to the article. Take a look at the welcome page to learn more about contributing to this encyclopedia. Thank you. - kollision (talk) 03:07, 4 March 2008 (UTC)


Disputed fair use rationale for Image:Primetimeofyourlife.jpg

Thank you for uploading Image:Primetimeofyourlife.jpg. However, there is a concern that the rationale provided for using this image under "fair use" may not meet the criteria required by Wikipedia:Non-free content. This can be corrected by going to the image description page and add or clarify the reason why the image qualifies for fair use. Adding and completing one of the templates available from Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy. Please be aware that a fair use rationale is not the same as an image copyright tag; descriptions for images used under the fair use policy require both a copyright tag and a fair use rationale.

If it is determined that the image does not qualify under fair use, it might be deleted by adminstrator within a few days in accordance with our criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions, please ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thank you.BetacommandBot (talk) 16:33, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #15

Number 15, April 5, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of March 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Cyclone Jokwe
Cyclone Jokwe

Cyclone Jokwe was the first tropical cyclone to make landfall in Mozambique since Cyclone Favio struck in the previous year. The tenth named storm of the 2007-08 South-West Indian Ocean cyclone season, Jokwe was first classified as a tropical depression on March 2 over the open Southwest Indian Ocean. It tracked west-southwest, crossing northern Madagascar as a tropical storm on March 5 before intensifying into a tropical cyclone on March 6. Jokwe rapidly intensified to reach peak winds of 195 km/h (120 mph), before weakening slightly and striking Nampula Province in northeastern Mozambique. It quickly weakened while paralleling the coastline, though the storm restrengthened as it turned southward in the Mozambique Channel. Late in its duration, it remained nearly stationary for several days, and steadily weakened due to wind shear before dissipating on March 16.

The storm caused minor damage in northern Madagascar. In Mozambique, the cyclone affected 165,000 people, and left at least sixteen fatalities. Cyclone Jokwe destroyed over 9,000 houses and damaged over 3,000 more, with the heaviest damage in Angoche and the Island of Mozambique in Nampula Province. The storm also caused widespread power outages and crop damages.

Other tropical cyclone activity

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The March member of the month is CapeVerdeWave, whose first edit was to a tropical cyclone article, back in January 2006. CapeVerdeWave has been a steady and active member of the project, writing several articles on Category 5 hurricanes as well as working on the often forgotten older hurricanes. The user also has contributed to some older season articles, and recently helped update the project after the recent hurricane re-analysis. We thank him for his continued dedication.

Main Page content

Storm article statistics

Grade Dec Jan Feb Mar
FA 33 33 36 38
A 9 9 8 8
GA 112 114 123 130
B 86 99 96 91
Start 208 214 216 211
Stub 6 3 6 9
Total 454 472 485 487
ω 2.98 2.98 2.96 2.94
percentage
Less than B 		47.1 46.0 45.8 45.2
percentage
GA or better 		33.9 33.1 34.3 36.1

Project News: Updates on the Best Track - Atlantic and North Indian Ocean, and more
In February, the Hurricane Research Division released its reanalysis for the Atlantic Ocean from 1915 to 1920. Highlights include the addition of eight storms, as well as the removal of one storm. The winds in the 1919 Florida Keys Hurricane were increased to 130 knots, and the 1916 Texas hurricane was increased to a Category 4 hurricane.

According to an email sent to the India Meteorological Department, there will be an online version of the North Indian Ocean best track from 1877 to 2006, scheduled to be released in two months; it is unknown if it will cost money to access.

In unrelated news, the project was featured on the Signpost; Mitchazenia was interviewed, and talked about the past, present, and future of the project.

At the end of the month, there were five different Featured content candidates (FXC's) by five different editors; two were featured article candidates, two were featured list candidates, and one was a featured picture candidate. The have been a few times in which there were four FXC's from four different editors, most recently in February and early March of 2008.

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 02:41, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


Justice "Cross" Album

Hi Douglas, I saw you moved the "Cross" album back to the dagger symbol. I don't think that a dagger should be used; this image displays why:

(the left of each pair of symbols). The dagger symbol has several different representations; many of them don't look anything like the cross on the cover, which is why I moved it to the "Latin Cross" symbol, which is exactly what is on the cover. —porges(talk) 09:27, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #16

Number 16, May 3, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of April 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Typhoon Neoguri on April 17
Typhoon Neoguri on April 17

Typhoon Neoguri was the earliest tropical cyclone on record to strike China. It formed on April 13 to the east of the Philippines, and once entering the South China Sea, environmental conditions allowed for quick strengthening. Neoguri attained its peak intensity of 150 km/h (90 mph) as it approached the island of Hainan, though rapidly weakened due to unfavorable conditions. The system made landfall in southern China on April 19, causing three deaths and moderate damage totaling over ¥296 million (2008 RMB, $42 million 2008 USD). The typhoon left 40 fishermen missing in the South China Sea.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • A weak tropical depression formed near New Caledonia in the South Pacific ocean early in the month, and another tropical depression developed in the basin later in the month.
  • Two named storms formed in the Australian region during the month, including Tropical Cyclone Durga, which was the first ever cyclone named by the Tropical Cyclone Warning Centre in Jakarta, Indonesia. Tropical Cyclone Rosie co-existed with Durga for much of its duration.
  • Cyclone Nargis developed in the North Indian Ocean late in the month, and reached its peak intensity early in May; further details will be covered in the next newsletter.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The April member of the month is VOFFA. Though not officially a project member, VOFFA is an important user to the project, having maintained and updated the talk page archives on tropical cyclones worldwide; activity includes adding warnings and discussions for all storms. The user is particularly active during the off-season of the Atlantic basin, when article activity on tropical cyclones typically declines.

Storm article statistics

Grade Jan Feb Mar Apr
FA 33 36 38 40
A 9 8 8 8
GA 114 123 130 131
B 99 96 91 103
Start 214 216 211 208
Stub 3 6 9 9
Total 472 485 487 499
ω 2.98 2.96 2.94 2.92
percentage
Less than B 		46.0 45.8 45.2 43.5
percentage
GA or better 		33.1 34.3 36.1 35.9

Project News
There is discussion on the status of articles on non-notable storms in the Merging page of the project. Comments are welcome.

A Wikipedia traffic counter was launched earlier this year. In the month of February, the article on Hurricane Katrina was viewed just over 200,000 times, making the article the 496th most viewed article on the English Wikipedia during the month.

During the month, Hurricane Camille was demoted from GA status, continuing the trend of good articles degrading in status on notable storms; other occurrences include the FA removal of Cyclone Tracy and 1900 Galveston Hurricane. If anyone has any ideas how to fix the problem, feedback and ideas are appreciated.

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 03:57, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

GTA IV Soundtrack

The reasoning behind keeping the name Sebastian instead of SebastiAn comes from Wikipedia:Manual of Style (capital letters) and WP:Trademarks. Unless individually pronounced (like SAT) all letters in a name and/or trademark, except the first, should be lowercase letters. In-fact the page for Sebastian should be changed. The other reason was because of how it appears in the game's credits, but that reason was secondary to the first. Rowdyoctopus (talk) 04:15, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I didn't do it just to make it look like I am right. I did it because it was going against the widely accepted WP:Trademarks. I admit the timing was shady, but I didn't do it to prove a point. Rowdyoctopus (talk) 07:33, 6 May 2008 (UTC)


Disputed fair use rationale for Image:Alive 1997 (2001 Daft Punk album).jpg}

Thank you for uploading Image:Alive 1997 (2001 Daft Punk album).jpg. However, there is a concern that the rationale provided for using this image under "fair use" may not meet the criteria required by Wikipedia:Non-free content. This can be corrected by going to the image description page and add or clarify the reason why the image qualifies for fair use. In particular, for each page the image is used on, the image must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page. Can you please check:

  • That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's escription page for each article the image is used in.
  • That every article it is used on is linked to from its description page.

Please be aware that a fair use rationale is not the same as an image copyright tag; descriptions for images used under the fair use policy require both a copyright tag and a fair use rationale.

If it is determined that the image does not qualify under fair use, it might be deleted by adminstrator within a few days in accordance with our criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions, please ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thank you. NOTE: once you correct this, please remove the tag from the image's page. STBotI (talk) 23:04, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #17

Number 17, June 7, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of May 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Cyclone Nargis
Cyclone Nargis

Cyclone Nargis was the costliest and deadliest natural disaster in the history of Burma (Myanmar). It formed on April 27 in the central Bay of Bengal, and after initially tracking north-northwestward it turned to the east. Quickly strengthening to reach peak winds of at least 165 km/h (105 mph), Nargis made landfall in the Ayeyarwady Division of Burma on May 2 near peak intensity. The cyclone killed at least 80,000 people and potentially over 300,000. Passing near the metropolis of Yangon, the cyclone destroyed thousands of buildings, and damage was estimated at over $10 billion (USD). In the wake of the storm, the ruling military junta of Burma initially refused foreign aid, and after they allowed foreign assistance, the government was criticized for its poor handling of the aftermath of the storm.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • Northwestern Pacific Ocean – Typhoon Rammasun was the strongest tropical cyclone worldwide during the month, though it did not affect land. Tropical Storm Matmo formed east of Luzon in the middle of the month and lasted for three days. Severe Tropical Storm Halong (Cosme) was the deadliest storm in the Pacific basin, causing 58 deaths and $94 million (USD) in damage after hitting Luzon on May 17. At the end of the month, Typhoon Nakri formed and reached peak intensity over open waters before becoming extratropical in early June.
  • Eastern Pacific Ocean – Tropical Storm Alma was was the easternmost forming Pacific tropical cyclone on record. Forming from a trough on May 29, it became a strong tropical storm before making landfall near León, Nicaragua, killing at least two people.
  • 2008 Atlantic hurricane season– Tropical Storm Arthur formed from the remnants of Tropical Storm Alma as it made landfall on Belize, causing flash flooding and at least nine fatalities.

Project News
Several other languages are active in the realm of tropical cyclone articles, though as much as ours. The French Wikipedia has 76 storm articles, the Spanish Wikipedia has 99 storm articles, and the Portuguese Wikipedia has 116 storm articles. Each of the projects have several storm articles we do not have, and the coverage on non-notable storms outside of the Atlantic is better, particularly in the Southern Hemisphere.

During the month, User:Potapych finished working on Template:Infobox Hurricane Small, which is used for the small Infoboxes in season articles; he has updated several season article already with the changes.

Main Page content

Storm article statistics

Grade Feb Mar Apr May
FA 36 38 40 41
A 8 8 8 17
GA 123 130 131 129
B 96 91 103 101
Start 216 211 208 209
Stub 7 9 9 9
Total 487 487 499 506
ω 2.96 2.94 2.92 2.88
percentage
≥Less than B 		45.8 45.2 43.5 43.1
percentage
≥GA or better 		34.3 36.1 35.9 367.0

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The May member of the month is Juliancolton. Joining the project in November 2007, Julian has become an active member of the project, working on new articles in the Atlantic basin. He has created two featured lists (List of Maryland and Washington, D.C. hurricanes (1980–present) and List of New York hurricanes), and rewrote the article on 2006 Atlantic hurricane season, which became featured during May. Juliancolton is currently working on a featured topic for Hurricane Dennis and its effects by region.

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 02:46, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #18

Number 18, July 5, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of June 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Satellite image of Typhoon Fengshen
Satellite image of Typhoon Fengshen

Typhoon Fengshen was the deadliest Pacific typhoon since Typhoon Durian in November of 2006. The sixth named storm of the 2008 Pacific typhoon season, Fengshen developed on June 18 to the east of the Philippines, and after attaining typhoon status it stuck the island of Samar. It intensified while passing through the archipelago, reaching winds of over 175 km/h (110 mph) before passing near Metro Manila. Fengshen later weakened in the South China Sea, and it dissipated on June 26 after moving ashore in China.

The typhoon killed over 1,300 people, including 800 when the MV Princess of the Stars capsized during the storm. Damage totaled $247 million (USD), with over 300,000 houses damaged or destroyed. The damage total included $70 million (USD) in crop damage.

Other tropical cyclone activity

Addition of C-class
During the month, C-class was added to the assessment scheme. The project has begun the process of integrating C-class, though as of this publication only 8 articles in the project are at that level. A preliminary solution would be to very strictly define B-class with six criteria, with one proposal to automatically re-assess all B-class articles as C-class until they are confirmed to have passed the criteria. Discussion and participation are welcome on the issue.

As a result of the addition of C-class, the ω (WikiWork) rating for C-class is now 3.5, to keep in line with the previous system we used.

During the month, the project published a page on its style for articles. The purpose for the page, as quoted from the top of the page, is to document a few existing unwritten guidelines for Wikipedia:WikiProject Tropical cyclones.

Storm article statistics

Grade Mar Apr May Jun
FA 38 40 41 41
A 8 8 17 18
GA 130 131 129 135
B 91 103 101 96
C 0 0 0 3
Start 211 208 209 208
Stub 9 9 9 9
Total 487 499 506 510
ω 2.94 2.92 2.88 2.87
percentage
≥Less than C 		45.2 43.5 43.1 42.5
percentage
≥GA or better 		36.1 35.9 37.0 38.0

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The June member of the month is User:Potapych. Though not officially a member of the project, Potapych is active on hurricane pages, having developed the new small infobox template introduced last month. After developing the new template, Potapych updated season articles across the board to accommodate the new template.

New members

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 03:34, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #19

Number 19, August 2, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of July 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Hurricane Bertha near peak intensity
Hurricane Bertha near peak intensity

Hurricane Bertha was a rare early season Cape Verde-type hurricane and the easternmost forming July tropical storm on record. Bertha became the longest-lived pre-August Atlantic tropical cyclone on record and the longest-lived tropical cyclone in the Atlantic Basin since Ivan in 2004. The second named storm of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season, Bertha developed from a tropical wave that emerged off the coast of Africa on July 1. After initially remaining weak while tracking westward, Bertha began to strengthen on July 6, and the next day it quickly intensified to reach peak winds of 120 mph (195 km/h). The hurricane weakened during the day on July 8, and after turning to a northwest drift, it passed within 40 miles (64 km) of Bermuda on July 14 before moving northeast away from the island. Bertha became extratropical on July 20 to the east of Newfoundland, after causing minimal damage and three indirect drowning deaths.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • Northwestern Pacific Ocean – After several weeks of no activity, Typhoon Kalmaegi developed in the middle of the month, passing near northern Luzon before turning to the north and making landfalls on Taiwan and China; the typhoon caused heavy crop damage and 18 deaths. Later in the month, Typhoon Fung-Wong caused further flooding in Taiwan and China. In addition to the two named typhoons, PAGASA issued advisories on Tropical Depression Gener early in the month.
  • Eastern Pacific Ocean – Four named storms developed in the basin during the month, of which three became hurricanes; Hurricanes Elida, Fausto, and Genevieve, as well as Tropical Storm Douglas, all remained offshore, though in the middle of the month a tropical depression brought rainfall to Mexico after hitting near Lázaro Cárdenas, Michoacán. Hurricane Boris and Tropical Storm Cristina continued from the previous month.
  • Atlantic Ocean– In addition to Hurricane Bertha, two other tropical cyclones developed in the month. Tropical Storm Cristobal formed off the coast of Florida, bringing rainfall and gusty winds to coastal North Carolina and later Nova Scotia. The most damaging Atlantic tropical cyclone during the month was Hurricane Dolly, which formed on July 20 in the western Caribbean Sea. After tracking northwestward through the Gulf of Mexico, it reached peak winds of 100 mph (155 km/h) before moving ashore on South Padre Island, Texas. The hurricane caused flash flooding from heavy rainfall, with damage in the United States estimated at $1.2 billion; across its path Dolly caused 21 deaths, including 17 from landslides in Guademala, as well as two indirect fatalities.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The July member of the month is User:Plasticup. Joining the project in August of 2007, Plasticup first became an asset in working on the active article series on Hurricane Dean. After a period of inactivity, the user returned to produce two featured articles this month, both interesting meteorological histories. Additionally, Plasticup has focused some attention to articles in the 2005 season. Keep up the good work!

New members

Main Page content

Storm article statistics </noinclude>

Grade Apr May Jun Jul
FA 40 41 41 42
A 8 17 18 18
GA 131 129 135 139
B 103 101 96 15
C 0 0 3 98
Start 208 209 208 202
Stub 9 9 9 10
Total 499 506 510 524
ω 2.92 2.88 2.87 2.94
percentage
≥Less than C 		43.5 43.1 42.5 40.5
percentage
≥GA or better 		35.9 37.0 38.0 38.0

Project News
During July, there were two large changes to the operations of the WikiProject. First, WPTC adopted and helped develop the WP 1.0 B-Class criteria, and was among the first projects to use a "forced" B-Class rubric as part of their assessment schemes. This means that all the articles tagged with {{hurricane|class=B|...}} are automatically reassessed as {{C-Class}}, unless all the values in the checklist are marked as passed. In other words, to mark an article as B-Class, the banner needs to be changed to 

{{hurricane |class=B |B1=yes |B2=yes  |B3=yes |B4=yes |B5=yes |B6=yes | ... }}

B1, B2, B3, B4, B5 and B6 stand for each of the six points in the WikiProject's rubric. The banner also has the capability to mark why an article doesn't meet the new B-Class standards: Typing the following in an article's talk page 

{{hurricane |class=B |B1=no |B2=yes |B3=yes |B4=yes |B5=yes |B6=yes | ... }}

will assess an article as C-Class, and mark that the article is not a B because of bad references.

Articles assessed as B's before the introduction of the forced checklist were automatically reassessed as C's, but they're awaiting new reviews to check if they still meet the new B criteria. These articles are listed on Category:Tropical cyclone articles with incomplete B-Class checklists. Currently, there's 117 articles in the category—let's try to shrink that number to zero before the next edition of the Herald!

The other major change to the WikiProject was the addition of three task forces: the storm articles task force, season articles task force, and the tropical meteorology articles task force. These three task forces allow WPTC to see the progress of the different areas of the WikiProject. Currently, all 1,076 WPTC articles have been assigned to one of the three task forces, but any unsorted articles will be placed in Category:Unsorted tropical cyclone articles as they're tagged with {{hurricane}}.

In order to categorize an article, the banner needs to be modified from {{hurricane|...}} to: 

{{hurricane |storms-task-force=yes | ... }}
{{hurricane |seasons-task-force=yes | ... }}
{{hurricane |meteo-task-force=yes | ... }}

which will sort the pages into the storms, seasons, and tropical meteorology task forces, respectively.

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 03:32, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Meetup

Wikipedia:Meetup/Tampa -- You're invited! Hires an editor (talk) 13:59, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

August 2008

Why do you assume it's vandalism?--76.10.75.168 (talk) 10:05, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #20

Number 20, September 6, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of August 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Hurricane Gustav at landfall in western Cuba at peak strength
Hurricane Gustav at landfall in western Cuba at peak strength

Hurricane Gustav was a deadly and damaging hurricane which formed late in the month in the Caribbean Sea. It first struck Haiti on August 26 as a minimal hurricane, where it killed 76 people and damaged or destroyed over 10,000 houses. Gustav turned to the southwest, moving over Jamaica where it killed 11 people. The hurricane rapidly intensified to reach peak winds of 150 mph (240 km/h) before making landfall on western Cuba; in the country, Gustav damaged or destroyed over 100,000 houses, though no deaths were reported due to well-executed evacuations. In the Gulf of Mexico, Gustav weakened due to its previous land interaction, and on September 1 it made landfall in south-central Louisiana as a Category 2 hurricane, where it caused heavy damage. Across its path, the hurricane caused 101 deaths, with an initial damage total of $20 billion.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • Atlantic Ocean– In addition to Gustav, three other tropical cyclones formed. Early in the month, Tropical Storm Edouard caused light damage when it moved ashore along Texas. In the middle of the month, Tropical Storm Fay formed over Hispaniola and later crossed over Cuba into the Gulf of Mexico; throughout the Caribbean it caused 25 deaths. Fay struck southwestern Florida, moved across the state, turned to the west, and moved across the Florida panhandle, making a record four landfalls on the state. The storm dropped 27.65 inches (702.1 mm) of rain in Melbourne, making Fay the fourth wettest Florida tropical cyclone. In the end of the month, Hurricane Hanna formed northeast of the Lesser Antilles; its impact will be covered in the next month's summary.
  • Eastern Pacific Ocean – Four named storms developed in the basin during the month, including Tropical Storm Kika, which was the first Central Pacific tropical cyclone since Ioke in 2006. Hurricane Hernan was the strongest hurricane of the month in the basin, reaching Category 3 status while remaining away from land. Tropical Storm Iselle lasted for a few days, but did not affect land. Tropical Storm Julio made landfall on Baja California Sur, producing heavy rainfall and causing two deaths.
  • Northwestern Pacific Ocean – The month began with Tropical Storm Kammuri forming and hitting southern China; the storm killed 140 people, mostly in neighboring Vietnam, and damage totaled $120 million (USD). Tropical Storms Phanfone and Vongfone lasted for a few days out at sea, before Typhoon Nuri formed and struck northern Luzon, causing 12 deaths.
  • 2008 North Indian Ocean cyclone season – A depression formed and struck Odisha.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The August member of the month is Cyclonebiskit, who has been on Wikipedia since April. The user helped maintain the current season articles as well as storm articles. Cyclonebiskit has written one GA, and wrote much of one of the recent tropical cyclone articles.

New and improved articles

Storm article statistics

Grade May Jun Jul Aug
FA 41 41 42 46
A 17 18 18 18
GA 129 135 139 147
B 101 96 15 15
C 0 3 98 99
Start 209 208 202 197
Stub 9 9 10 15
Total 506 510 524 537
ω 2.88 2.87 2.94 2.92
percentage
≥Less than C 		43.1 42.5 40.5 39.5
percentage
≥GA or better 		37.0 38.0 38.0 39.3

Version 0.7
This month, several of the WikiProject's articles were selected for the Version 1.0 Editorial Team's Version 0.7 static release. The article selection occurs using an automated process using WikiProjects' quality and importance assessments. For WPTC, this means that 29 articles will be part of this release, an increase from 13 in the previous release. It should be noted that these numbers are based on preliminary data that can change based on updates to the database and corrections to the selection algorithm and WP:1.0's cut-off score.

The list of articles chosen for the release can be seen here. Of the selection, almost half of the articles are already featured, and eleven are good articles. There one B-Class article (1970 Bhola cyclone, two C-Class articles (Hurricane Andrew, Cyclone Nargis), and two Start-Class articles (Pacific typhoon, Hurricane Rita). As these articles will be published in a CD, it is imperative that the project improve them quickly.

The full list of all the WikiProject's articles is also available here. According to that list, WPTC's highest-scoring article—Tropical cyclone—has a score of 1969, which is very good as Canada, the selection's highest-scoring article, has a score of 2,409. That said, Extreme wind warning is the least important article we have, with a score of 227, so we may have to improve it a little bit so it isn't that low...

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 05:14, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Disputed non-free use rationale for Image:Alive 1997 (2001 Daft Punk album).jpg

Thank you for uploading Image:Alive 1997 (2001 Daft Punk album).jpg. However, there is a concern that the rationale provided for using this image on Wikipedia may not meet the criteria required by Wikipedia:Non-free content. This can be corrected by going to the image description page and add or clarify the reason why the image qualifies under this policy. Adding and completing one of the templates available from Wikipedia:Non-free use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy. Please be aware that a non-free use rationale is not the same as an image copyright tag; descriptions for images used under the non-free content policy require both a copyright tag and a non-free use rationale.

If it is determined that the image does not qualify under the non-free content policy, it might be deleted by an administrator within a few days in accordance with our criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions, please ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thank you. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 23:26, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #21

Number 21, October 4, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of September 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

As a result of an extended Wikibreak, I will not be able to work on the next month's newsletter. Other users are welcome to get it together. ♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 03:53, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Storm of the month

Hurricane Ike over the Gulf of Mexico
Hurricane Ike over the Gulf of Mexico

Hurricane Ike was among the costliest Atlantic hurricanes on record, based on a preliminary damage estimate of $31.5 billion (USD). The ninth named storm, fifth hurricane, and third major hurricane of the 2008 season, Ike developed on September 1 in the tropical Atlantic Ocean. Maintaining a generally westward track throughout its duration, Ike reached Category 4 status on the Saffir-Simpson scale, moving across the Turks and Caicos Islands at that intensity before weakening and crossing Cuba; heavy damage was reported in Cuba, which was still recovering from Hurricane Gustav just weeks prior. Gustav later moved across the Gulf of Mexico and struck near Galveston, Texas, where its effects were estimated as the costliest hurricane in Texas history. Further inland, the storm brought high winds and widespread damage, and its impact reached as far as Canada. Throughout its path, Gustav caused over 100 deaths, mostly in Texas and Haiti, and several hundred remain missing.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • Atlantic Ocean– In addition to Ike, two hurricanes from the previous month, Gustav and Hanna, lasted into September, both striking the United States. Tropical Storm Josephine formed while Ike and Hanna were active; it remained away from land and dissipated four days after forming. The tropics were quiet in the Atlantic for about 10 days after Ike dissipated, until Hurricane Kyle formed north of Hispaniola; its precursor brought heavy rains to the Greater Antilles, and Kyle ultimately became extratropical as it moved into Atlantic Canada. At the end of the month, Tropical Storm Laura formed from a subtropical cyclone far away from land; it persisted until early October, when it lost tropical characteristics to the southeast of Newfoundland.
  • Eastern Pacific Ocean– The month in the eastern Pacific Ocean was the quietest on record, in terms of ACE index. Early in the month, Tropical Storm Karina lasted for two days without affecting land. A few days later, Tropical Storm Lowell formed and later affected the Baja California peninsula and mainland Mexico as a tropical depression; its remnants merged with the remnants of Ike.
  • Western Pacific Ocean– Five named storms developed in the western Pacific, beginning with Typhoon Sinlaku which became a powerful cyclone before weakening and bringing heavy rainfall to Taiwan; there, it caused 11 deaths and heavy damage, and it later affected Japan. The second storm of the month was Typhoon Hagupit, which caused $1 billion (USD) in damage and 68 deaths when it struck China. Typhoon Jangmi was next, which brought further damage and deaths to Taiwan. Two more tropical storms developed during the month; Mekkhala formed in the South China Sea and caused heavy damage in Vietnam, while Higos moved across the Philippines and later struck China.
  • North Indian Ocean– One deep depression formed during the month, which moved ashore in the Indian province of Odisha; it caused 25 deaths from heavy rainfall.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The September member of the month is CrazyC83, who has been a steady editor within the project for the past few years. Lately, the user's contributions include maintaining the current season articles, which is the biggest workload for the project. In the past, however, CrazyC83 was very active in writing articles, and was a proponent for all storms in the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season getting articles. Of note was his contributions to Hurricane Juan, which brought it to featured status and later to the main page.

Storm article statistics

Grade Jun Jul Aug Sep
FA 41 42 46 47
A 18 18 18 19
GA 135 139 147 161
B 96 15 15 17
C 3 98 99 107
Start 208 202 197 201
Stub 9 10 15 19
Total 510 524 537 571
ω 2.87 2.94 2.92 2.92
percentage
≥Less than C 		42.5 40.5 39.5 38.5
percentage
≥GA or better 		38.0 38.0 39.3 39.8

Project News
Overall, the project has had a relatively uneventful month. One of the most noteworthy events was the selection of 32 tropical cyclone-related articles, that were chosen as part of Wikipedia 0.7. Wikipedia 0.7 is a collection of English Wikipedia articles due to be released on DVD, and available for free download, later this year. While many of the selected articles are of featured or good quality, several require substantial cleanup and expansion.

In other news, a handful of changes to project standards have taken place. Per a consensus on the project's talk page, the section of each tropical cyclone article previously entitled "Storm history" has been changed to "Meteorological history", thanks in part to Plasticup's bot which preformed the hundreds of edits to execute the change. In addition, a discussion is ongoing regarding the necessity of List of storms in the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, and similar articles for other seasons.

♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 03:57, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #22

Number 22, November 2, 2008

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of October 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Cyclone X2008 Yemen floods
Cyclone X

Deep Depression ARB 02 caused the 2008 Yemen floods. On October 19 the IMD noted that an area of low pressure which located to the south east of Salalah, Oman had intensifed in to a tropical depression and was assigned the number ARB 02. On October 21 IMD updated the system to a Deep Depression while it lay 700 km south of Salalah, Oman near the east coast of Somalia. It lost its strength while crossing the Gulf of Aden due to entry of dry air and land interaction as it passed close to the northeastern coast of Somalia. It later was downgraded to a Depression, named TC 03B by the JTWC. On October 24 it made landfall on the south-eastern coast of Yemen, leaving at least 26 civilians and six soldiers dead while trapping hundreds of people due to flooding and torrential rainfalls. The latest figure of casualties is of 184 persons dead and 100 others missing, mostly from the region of Hadhramawt, where the storm made landfall. A total of 733 houses were destroyed in the governorates of Hadhramaut and Al Mahrah, while 22,000 people were displaced. The Yemeni Government declared the two aforementioned governorates as disaster zones.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • Atlantic Ocean– In the Atlantic, four tropical cyclones formed this October. Tropical Storm Marco formed in the Bay of Campeche on October 6. It made landfall on October 8 and is one of the smallest Atlantic tropical cyclones since 1988. Tropical Storm Nana formed October 12 in the middle of the open Atlantic. It had no impact anywhere and dissipated October 14. Hurricane Omar formed October 13 and dissipated October 18. Eventually peaking as a Category 4 hurricane, Omar passed through the Lesser Antilles twice, including once near peak intensity. Fortunately, it caused only one indirect death. Tropical Depression Sixteen formed on October 16 and dissipated two days later after making landfall. It killed 16 to 20 people in Central America.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The October member of the month is Hurricanehink. Since joining the project near its inception, Hurricanehink has been involved in bringing forty two articles, eighteen lists and six topics to featured status. Just this month, Hurricanehink was mentioned in the Signpost Dispatch. Hurricanehink has also been the regular distributor for this newsletter.

New and improved articles

Main Page content

Storm article statistics

Grade Jul Aug Sep Oct
FA 42 46 47 48
A 18 18 19 19
GA 139 145 161 187
B 15 14 17 12
C 98 99 107 113
Start 202 197 201 201
Stub 10 15 19 20
Total 524 537 571 600
ω 2.94 2.92 2.92 2.88
percentage
≥Less than C 		40.5 39.5 38.5 36.8
percentage
≥GA or better 		38.0 39.3 39.8 42.3

Project News
A discussion concerning sandboxes for next year's articles has begun. Please consider working on sandboxes so they will be ready to publish. As tropical cyclones can form at any time in the western Pacific and northern Indian Oceans, these two season's should be made ready for cyclones by December. Ideally, due to the possibility of pre-season storms, the eastern Pacific and Atlantic seasons should also be ready by then, but they should at least be ready by the northern-Hemisphere antipeak in late February and early March. Seasons for the years 2010 to 2015 should be given the name "Post-2009 {ocean name} {cyclone term} seasons", as in "Post 2009 Atlantic hurricane seasons".

A category for tropical cyclone articles of very-low importance has been introduced. Although discussion is still ongoing, a rating of very-low-importance will generally be given to weak cyclones that do not have impact or set any sort of record.

Editorial
This month, our usual editor, Hurricanehink, has been on a semi-wikibreak until further notice. I am filling in as editor and distributor on an interim basis. The newsletter will continue as normal during that time. Thank you. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 00:49, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 01:25, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Request to move article B.O.M.B. (album) incomplete

You recently filed a request at Wikipedia:Requested moves to move the page B.O.M.B. (album) to a different title - however your proposal is either incomplete or has been contested as being controversial. As a result, it has been moved to the incomplete and contested proposals section. Requests that remain incomplete after five days will be removed.

Please make sure you have completed all three of the following:

  1. Added {{move|NewName}} at the top of the talk page of the page you want moved, replacing "NewName" with the new name for the article. This creates the required template for you there.
  2. Added a place for discussion at the bottom of the talk page of the page you want to be moved. This can easily be accomplished by adding {{subst:RMtalk|NewName|reason for move}} to the bottom of the page, which will automatically create a discussion section there.
  3. Added {{subst:RMlink|PageName|NewName|reason for move}} to the top of today's section here.

If you need any further guidance, please leave a message at Wikipedia talk:Requested moves or contact me on my talk page. - JPG-GR (talk) 07:42, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Replaceable fair use Image:Daft Punk.jpg

Replaceable fair use
Replaceable fair use

Thanks for uploading Image:Daft Punk.jpg. I noticed the description page specifies that the media is being used under a claim of fair use, but its use in Wikipedia articles fails our first non-free content criterion in that it illustrates a subject for which a freely licensed media could reasonably be found or created that provides substantially the same information. If you believe this media is not replaceable, please:

  1. Go to the media description page and edit it to add {{di-replaceable fair use disputed}}, without deleting the original replaceable fair use template.
  2. On the image discussion page, write the reason why this image is not replaceable at all.

Alternatively, you can also choose to replace this non-free media by finding freely licensed media of the same subject, requesting that the copyright holder release this (or similar) media under a free license, or by taking a picture of it yourself.

If you have uploaded other non-free media, consider checking that you have specified how these images fully satisfy our non-free content criteria. You can find a list of description pages you have edited by clicking on this link. Note that even if you follow steps 1 and 2 above, non-free media which could be replaced by freely licensed alternatives will be deleted 2 days after this notification (7 days if uploaded before 13 July 2006), per our non-free content policy. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. Do you want to opt out of receiving this notice? ˉˉanetode╦╩ 16:37, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #23

Number 23,

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of November & December 2008.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Storm of the month

Hurricane Paloma
Hurricane Paloma

Hurricane Paloma
Hurricane Paloma was the second most powerful November hurricane on record in the Atlantic Basin, behind Hurricane Lenny in 1999. It was the third and final major hurricane to hit Cuba in 2008, being the first time that three major hurricanes have struck Cuba in one season. It also marked the first time that at least one major hurricane formed in every month of the hurricane season from July to November, with only June not having a major hurricane this season.

Hurricane Paloma was also the last Tropical Depression of the 2008 season, and caused at least $1.4 billion in damage and was responsible for at least one direct death.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • South Indian– Cyclone Bernard was the first cyclone of the year to move into the Australian Region from the Southwest Indian Ocean. Forming on early on November 19 it quickly intensified into a Moderate Tropical Storm the next day, however as it moved westward it weakened into a Tropical Depression and moved into Australia's Bureau of Meteorology's area of responsibility and dissipated later on November 21.
  • Australian - There were four tropical lows during November and December with Tropical Low ex Bernard moving into the Australian Region from the South-West Indian Ocean. Two of the Lows developed into Tropical Cyclones being named Anika and Billy respectively. Anika intensified into a category two cyclone whilst Cyclone Billy became a Severe Tropical Cyclone after it had affected Northern Australia.
  • The 2008–09 South Pacific cyclone season got off to an slow start during November and December, with three Tropical Disturbances forming during December. Only one of the tropical disturbances developed into a tropical depression.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The November/December member of the month is Thegreatdr, who has been a steady editor within the project for the past few years. Lately, the user's contributions include improving some of the Pacific Typhoon season articles from the 1980s. Thegreatdr has also tipped us off about going on's at the National Hurricane Center and the Hydrometeorological Prediction Center.

New and improved articles

Main Page content

Storm article statistics

Grade Sep Oct Nov Dec
FA 47 49 49 50
A 19 19 19 19
GA 161 187 198 202
B 17 13 21 22
C 107 119 118 122
Start 201 204 210 210
Stub 19 19 16 17
Total 571 613 631 642
ω 2.92 2.88 2.87 2.87
percentage
≥Less than C 		38.5 36.4 35.8 35.4
percentage
≥GA or better 		39.8 42.1 42.2 42.2

Project News
During the last two months there have been several important discussions of which some are still seeking contributions from members. These include discussions about:

Project Importance - Is it better to rate Storm Importance by basin or by overall importance? - There seems to be a consensus to rate storm importance on a case by case basis, though there still needs to be a bit more discussion on this matter.
Prominent units within TC articles: Imperial or SI? - Which should be the prominent unit outside the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific Basins, Knots or MPH? Generally people think that Knots should not be used except in the general science articles and infoboxes.
ACE - Where and how, should it be used? - We have decided that it should not be used outside the Atlantic or the Eastern Pacific hurricane Seasons. A debate is still ongoing with a view too get rid of it all together.
JMA Tropical Depressions Should we include them with the season articles or not? - The general consensus so far seems to be that we should include them in the season articles though this debate is still ongoing.

We discovered during December that the Australian Bureau of Meteorology have started to designate the Tropical Lows that form within their region with letter U. It is unclear whether either TCWC Jakarta or TCWC Port Moresby assign any designations to lows that form within their Area of Responsibility.

–Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 02:56, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Orphaned non-free media (File:Nympho album.jpeg)

Thanks for uploading File:Nympho album.jpeg. The media description page currently specifies that it is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, it is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the media was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that media for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

If you have uploaded other unlicensed media, please check whether they're used in any articles or not. You can find a list of 'image' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "Image" from the dropdown box. Note that all non-free media not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. BJBot (talk) 05:18, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Essential Mix

Ok, well maybe a List of Essential Mix episodes article would be appropriate then. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Account9000 (talk • contribs) 00:42, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #24

Number 24, March 7

The Hurricane Herald

This is the bi-monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to give a summary, both of the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclone activity. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers all of January 2009 and February 2009.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Cyclone Fanele near peak intensity
Cyclone Fanele near peak intensity

Storm of the month
Cyclone Fanele was the first cyclone of tropical cyclone status to strike western Madagascar since Cyclone Fame one year prior. It formed on January 18 in the Mozambique Channel, and rapidly organized, reaching peak winds of 185 km/h (115 mph). It weakened before moving ashore in Menabe Region southwest of Morondava, and rapidly deteriorated over land. Fanele briefly re-intensified after reaching open waters, only to become an extratropical cyclone by January 23. The cyclone caused heavy damage near where it moved ashore and along its path, resulting in at least eight deaths. Fanele struck Madagascar just two days after Tropical Storm Eric brushed the northeastern portion of the country. The two storms affected over 50,000 people, of which at least 4,000 were left homeless. Fanele struck the country during a series of government protests, and consequentially relief efforts were hindered.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • Western Pacific Ocean– The first tropical cyclone of the season was Tropical Depression Auring, as designated by PAGASA. It formed on January 3 to the east of the Philippines, producing heavy rainfall and flooding on Mindanao island. Never organizing much, the depression dissipated a few days after forming, causing one death and destroying 305 houses. The next month, Tropical Depression Bising formed near Palau and, moving westward, later passed through the Philippines as a remnant low; rainfall from the system produced mudslides, though no major damage was reported.
  • South-West Indian– Tropical Storm Dongo was the first storm of January in the basin, and it remained over open waters without affecting landmasses throughout its duration. In the middle of the month along with Cyclone Fanele, Tropical Storm Eric developed and moved near Madagascar, killing one and producing heavy rainfall in the northeastern portion of the country. Later, Cyclone Gael killed two people on Réunion while tracking for ten days east of Madagascar; at the time it was the 2nd strongest cyclone of the season. Lastly, Tropical Storm Hina persisted for about five days, nearly reaching tropical cyclone status before weakening.
  • Australia- During the previous two months their have been nine Tropical Lows with four of them becoming a Tropical Cyclone whilst the remants of Cyclone Innis briefly moved into the Australian Region from the South Pacific. Cyclones Charlotte, Dominic, Ellie, and Freddy all caused damage to Australia and or the Indonesia Islands.
  • South Pacific- During the last two months the south Pacific has come alive with six depressions forming in January and February. The most significant depression was Tropical Depression 04F which brought heavy rainfall to Fiji and caused widespread flooding and killing at least 11 people. The first two named storms, Hettie and Innis also developed, each having minor effects on land.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The member of the month is... HurricaneSpin HurricaneSpin is a relativly new member of the project who has helped the project out by finding photos of Tropical Cyclones and uploading them to Commons. He is still getting to grips with the project but is coming on in leaps and bounds thus we have decided to make him the Member of the Month, for January and February 2009.

New and improved articles

Main Page content

Storm article statistics

Grade Oct Nov Dec Feb
FA 49 50 50 56
A 19 19 19 17
GA 190 198 202 239
B 13 21 22 14
C 119 118 122 122
Start 204 210 210 198
Stub 19 16 17 28
Total 613 631 642 669
ω 2.88 2.87 2.87 2.80
percentage
≥Less than C 		36.4 35.8 35.4 33.0
percentage
≥GA or better 		42.1 42.2 42.2 46.6

Project News
The project reached a milestone in the last two months in terms of article quality for all articles within the project. For the first time, the percentage of Good articles or better reached more than 1/3, and at the same time, the percentage of Start or Stub articles totaled less than 50%. In the previous twelve months, the overall project grew by 262 articles, of which 204, or 78%, were GA or better. Additionally, in terms of only storm articles, the project now has 46.6% of its articles as GA or better, and only 1/3 are Start or Stub. Unfortunately, much of that is due to newly-created articles easily attaining GA status. For storm articles, the total number of Start or Stub articles, currently 226, is about the same as it was a year ago. The lack of work on older articles is especially noticeable on season articles, where more than 75% of articles are still Stub or Start.

In an attempt to improve articles, there is talk of forming a collaboration between a few Wikipedians. The current project is to improve Hurricane Camille to FA status in time for its 40th anniversary this August. There is still plenty of work to be done, so if you're interested, any help would be appreciated.

Additionally, there is a recent discussion on the WPTC talk page about establishing a notability criteria. There was talk in the past of instating one, although this time the proposal is backed up by interpretations of existing Wikipedia policy. The proposal would limit articles to tropical cyclones that have at least one independent, reliable source other than any warning centers. Excluding cross-basin, off-season, or 64+ knot cyclones, the proposal would affect 26 articles, none of which affected land or lasted for an appreciable amount of time.

Jason Rees (talk) 01:07, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Crydamoure Presents Waves series

Everywhere I looked on the internet, I always saw "Crydamoure Presents Waves" and "Crydamoure Presents Waves II." I thought that was the actual full title, so I created both articles with that.(LonerXL (talk) 18:16, 2 April 2009 (UTC))

Discogs is usersubmitted? ...And I didn't even know about Astralwerks. I though it was 100% Crydamoure independently. Seems to me that YOU should have made those articles instead of me. I find it kinda funny that others knew alot more, but yet one did any "wiki actions" until after I created both of them.(LonerXL (talk) 16:20, 3 April 2009 (UTC))
So the worth and "legalization" of an article depends on it's demand? If that's really the case, then that explains why the majority of the decent articles that I start get downplayed and/or deleted. I'm very glad and thankful that somebody finally explained this to me. For a while, I started to wonder if there was some wannabe elite "wiki-imps and wiki-trolls" who just wanted to make problems in my "wiki-life."(LonerXL (talk) 00:02, 4 April 2009 (UTC))

Tropical cyclones WikiProject Newsletter #25

Number 25, April 4

The Hurricane Herald

This is the monthly newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The Hurricane Herald aims to provide a summary of both the activities of the WikiProject and global tropical cyclones. If you wish to change how you receive this newsletter, or no longer wish to receive it, please add your username to the appropriate section on the mailing list. This newsletter covers March 2009.

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve monitoring of the WikiProject's articles.

Satellite image of Hamish near peak intensity

Storm of the month
Cyclone Hamish formed as a Tropical Low to the south of Papua New Guinea on March 4. The low quickly organized and became Tropical cyclone Hamish the following day. Hamish then started to rapidly intensify, becoming the second severe tropical cyclone of the season the next day. Throughout much of its duration, it moved southeastward, parallel to the coast of Queensland. It underwent rapid deepening over a period of 48 hours, Hamish reached peak winds of 215 km/h (130 mph) according to the Australia Bureau of Meteorology, making the cyclone a Category 5 on the Australian intensity scale. It quickly weakened due to wind shear, and without moving ashore it stalled and turned to a northwest drift. The low dissipated on March 5.

Hamish indirectly caused a major environmental disaster along the Queensland coastline, when strong waves from the cyclone damaged the hull of a cargo ship, spilling 260 tonnes of fuel and oil into the ocean. The oil washed onto the coastline, endangering the environment prompting a costly cleanup. Offshore, the fishermen went missing after the boat was lost; one person was found, although the other two remained missing and were presumed dead. As the storm remained offshore, overall damage directly from the storm was minor, primarily from strong waves.

Other tropical cyclone activity

  • Australia – In addition to Cyclone Hamish, three other cyclones formed and were named as Gabrielle, Ilsa and Jasper. However, there was no impact reported from these three storms whilst in the Australian region.
  • South Pacific – This month Cyclones Joni and Ken formed near to the Cook Islands, whilst Cyclone Jasper moved into the area at its peak and brought heavy rain and coastal erosion to New Caledonia. On the last day of the month Tropical Depression 14F formed to the northeast Fiji.
  • South-West Indian – Severe Tropical Storm Izilda was the only storm to form in the South-West Indian Ocean this month; however the extratropical remnants of Ilsa moved into the region from the Australian basin.

Member of the month

Cyclone barnstar
Cyclone barnstar

The member of the month is... Ramisses, has been a member of the Project since January 2008. He is a usefull editor who helps to make the trackmaps for the current season articles, as well as numerous other storms, from previous seasons. We just hope he is able to keep on top of the trackmaps when the busy part of the year comes!

Main Page content

Storm article statistics

Grade Nov Dec Feb Mar
FA 50 50 56 56
A 19 19 17 17
GA 198 202 239 244
B 21 22 14 15
C 118 122 122 120
Start 210 210 198 192
Stub 16 17 28 34
Total 631 642 669 678
ω 2.87 2.87 2.80 2.81
percentage
≥Less than C 		35.8 35.4 33.0 33.3
percentage
≥GA or better 		42.2 42.2 46.6 46.8

Project News
There is a discussion on the state of the project, discussing whether it still works like it used to, and what can be done about it. One extreme position is labeling the project inactive, while another position is eliminating some of the bureaucracy. Input would be very beneficial.

As part of the above discussion, there is a request for all active members to sign a list to affirm they are still active members in the project. If you don't sign the list, or if you don't consider yourself active anymore, your name will be placed on the inactive members list on May 1st.

Hurricanehink has organised a challenge to try and improve some of the Tropical cyclone articles. The rules are that you must take either an seasonal or a storm article from one of the eight basins we have, that is either a Stub, Start class or a brand new article and improve it to at least GA status. However to avoid several articles on cyclones that did not affect land, Hurricanehink has limited the challenge to storms/seasonal articles of Mid-importance or higher. Their is an exception to this rule for the Central Pacific as Cyclones rarely form in this basin. - For full details of the challenge see the Project's Talkpage Project member list

Jason Rees (talk) 01:26, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:The_Grid/Archive_4&oldid=1232415097"