Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Typhoon Pongsona

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 02:18, 9 September 2007.

[edit] Typhoon Pongsona

It's been a while. I've worked on this article on and off for a while, now, and I think it's finally up to par for FA status. Comments are welcome. Hurricanehink (talk) 03:31, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

  • Support, well-written and comprehensive. Appears to meet the FA criteria. However, I would reword "the eye became more defined" in the storm history to "better defined", since the previous paragraph established that Pongsona had begun forming an eye. --Coredesat 00:01, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
  • Support, extremely well-written, great use of 31 references. However, I would recommend making Pongsona's retirement a section (as it is in many other articles) so one can find it easily. Also, redlinks look a little bad in such a great article. You might want to delink them for now. -- 01:17, 2 August 2007 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by RattleMan (talk • contribs).
    • I took out two of the redlinks (leaving one, the National Meteorological Center of China, which could get an article). Regarding retirement, I'm not so sure I want a separate section for two sentences. It is mentioned in the lede, after all. Hurricanehink (talk) 01:28, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment - object in principle (not as a !vote). I'd like to see this FAC not pass on the merit of only two supports from WPTC users one of whom hardly does comment on FACs at all (no offence Rattle). – Chacor 14:09, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment While the article meets the explicit (i.e. bulleted) Featured article criteria I do not honestly think that it "features professional standards of writing and presentation". It could be a little smoother. For example, this sentence seems a little confused: "Additionally, President Bush authorized for disaster assistance for the Federated States of Micronesia". Furthermore, how much assistance did he authorize? Plasticup T/C 19:21, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
    • It doesn't say it on the FEMA website how much assistance was authorized (link). I fixed the wording, however. Hurricanehink (talk) 19:29, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment These fixes needed:
  • "150 people on Rota sought shelter" – sentences shouldn't begin with numerals
  • Some measurements are missing non-breaking spaces.
  • "As the eyes of 6 typhoons had passed over" - 6 should be spelled out
  • A pdf source needs identifying
  • I think there is an overuse of the word "with" as an additive link, which makes the prose seem a bit sloppy, for example:
  • "the passage of Pongsona caused two destroyed homes, with seven receiving major damage"
  • "Nearly 29,000 individuals registered for disaster assistance, with the first assistance check arriving ten days after". Epbr123 21:07, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Thanks for giving it a look, and I believe I addressed those comments. I'll admit, I do use "with" as a pseudo conjunction a little too much, and I went through and got rid of a few. Hurricanehink (talk) 23:30, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Support. Looks good. One thing: in the first sentence of "Differences among warning centers", use sustained winds for what? measuring, averaging, estimating...out wind speeds? --maclean 05:04, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
    • Well, JTWC and JMA both use 1-minute and 10-minute wind speeds in their advisories. I don't see anything wrong with it. Hurricanehink (talk) 13:36, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Comment—I'm not thrilled with the prose.

  • "10-min winds"—what are they? 10-minute winds? Usually, abbreviated units are not hyphenated (ISO). Later, we have "1-min" in tiny font-size.
  • "Damage on the island totaled over $700 million (2002 USD, $800 million 2007 USD)"—What about "Damage on Guam exceeded $700M (equivalent to $800M in 2007)"? MOS says US-related articles don't need to specify US dollars.
  • Why italics for the first caption?
  • MOS says that you must spell out main units on first occurrence; thereafter, they may be abbreviated (as the conversions always are), but only with the consensus of the contributors. This applies to "min", too. Can you link it (it's unfamiliar)?
  • "Following the experience from previous typhoons, the Guam newspaper Pacific Daily News underwent great preparedness actions, including installing storm shutters, reinforcing the building, using three generators with a fuel tank installed after a previous typhoon, water supplies, and sufficient food supplies for the staff." Chop up this snake.
  • "inHg"—one word?
  • "et. al"—Nope, the dot goes after "al". Tony 12:58, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
Thanks a lot for getting around to it (I can see why you weren't thrilled). First, I got the et al.'s (stupid mistake). I wikilinked inHg, and spelled out mbar on its first occurrence. The snake was chopped. I wrote out the main units upon first usage (think I got all of them). The first image caption has italics because that is integrated into the hurricane infobox, so it's not something I can change for the article. I disagree with you regarding the damage total; not everyone knows Guam is a part of the United States and that is uses USD, and additionally that format has become standard on tropical cyclone articles. I linked the first 10-min winds (linking minute), and made that and other 10-min or 1-min small in parenthesis. Hurricanehink (talk) 14:16, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Oppose—1a. Thanks for improving it, but it's easy to find bad writing, at this late stage. Can you bring on board others with fresh eyes?
    • "One-hundred fifty people on Rota sought shelter, and in Saipan 549 people were in shelters ..."—Why not express both consistently, thus allowing numerals: "On Rota, 159 people sought shelter, and in Saipan, 549 were in shelters ..."
    • "Several schools opened classrooms as evacuation centers, as well." Remove the last two words, which are inelegant and redundant.
    • "The Guam office of civil defense filed the necessary paperwork for Federal Emergency Management Agency to declare the island as a disaster area. Governor Carl T.C. Gutierrez also took similar measures to declare a state of emergency for the area." Remove "necessary" and "as", and add "the" before "Federal". "Also" is wrong—you haven't just told us what the governor did to be adding to it now. Just remove it.
    • "Following the experience from previous typhoons, the Guam newspaper Pacific Daily News underwent great preparedness actions to provide internet updates"—Yuck: "great preparedness actions"? Remove "the". This is not good enough.
    • Yuck indeed. I was disappointed when I copyedited it again (my eyes are fresh after not looking at for over a month), but I believe I fixed the examples of bad writing. Hurricanehink (talk) 18:05, 27 August 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment, will support once these issues have been taken care of:
    • "The name "Pongsona" was contributed by North Korea and is the Korean name for the garden balsam." What does "contributed" mean here? Does it mean "suggested"?
    • "Considered by some to be the worst typhoon to have struck Guam [...]" Weasel word.
    • "The Guam office of civil defense filed the paperwork for the Federal Emergency Management Agency to declare the island a disaster area." Shouldn't "office of civil defense" be capitalized?
    • "Communications on the island failed due to the winds;[19] the entire island was left without power and phone service." For how long?
    • "With thirteen Red Cross shelters across Guam,[27] most remained in shelters for about three weeks before disaster tents were distributed." Red Cross links to the international movement. Are you sure it wasn't the American Red Cross?--Carabinieri 01:55, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
  • First, delegates from North Korea provided the name Pongsona to the list of Pacific typhoon names. Next, I removed "by some", as it still holds true. Got the third thing. For the fourth item, the source does not say how long, and I couldn't find another source that says exactly how long areas experienced power outages. Should I add temporarily before "without power"? Lastly, yea, my bad. Hurricanehink (talk) 02:04, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
For the first point, I'd change it to "added to the list of Pacific typhoon names by North Korea" or something similar, since as it is, it's kind of hard to understand. The sentence in point two is still weasly. In what sense was the storm the worst? Material damage? Injuries?--Carabinieri 02:55, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
I personally disagree for the first point, as it goes against the typhoon article standards. Also, the second point is not weasly at all. From the National Weather Service Assessment of the typhoon, "Super Typhoon Pongsona was one of the worst typhoons to ever strike the island of Guam." Shortly after that in the same document, "Since such a large portion of the population experienced the worst part of the storm, there was a perception this was the worst typhoon to ever strike Guam." It is the Public Domain words of the National Weather Service, not mine, that refer the typhoon as the worst on the island. Furthermore, the article already lists that Pongsona was among the most intense and costliest to strike Guam. Hurricanehink (talk) 03:13, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
But the weather service explains why it was the worst: it was in the top three for intensity, and the top five for material damage. "Considered the worst typhoon to have struck Guam" sounds like this is a widespread scientific or somehow informed view, which definately is not the case, this was just public perception, the article needs to make both points clearer. As to the first point, I don't know if very many readers will be aware that there is a list of typhoon names, which countries add names to. If you don't know this, I think the sentence is pretty hard to understand.--Carabinieri 11:11, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
I think the article does make it pretty clear. When that statement appears in the article (4th paragraph of Guam impact), it is after other statistics on the typhoon (among the most intense and costliest). However, I'll agree with you on the second point, and I linked the Lists of tropical cyclone names in the lede. Hurricanehink (talk) 15:10, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
Pongsona is not "[c]considered the worst typhoon to have struck Guam" by the National Weather Service for example. It states that there were several typhoos that were intense and costlier. It was merely perceived by the public as being worse according to the NWS. The lead currently reads as if experts or whoever thought it was the worst.--Carabinieri 16:11, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
Fine, you win. I removed that statement from the lede. Are there any other objections? Hurricanehink (talk) 16:21, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
Although I didn't think of this as a competition, thanks. Support.--Carabinieri 16:23, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
  • MOS says for US-related articles, just the dollar sign is enough. Please remove "USD" throughout, and don't link it (MOS).
  • "thiry-eighth" and "ten", yet tons of numericalised values. See MOS.
  • MOS breach in the abbreviations and spellings out of units and conversions; they're not even consistently wrong. Please consult MOS. Tony 11:22, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
    • First, I am opting to ignore the MOS for this one, as not every one knows Guam and other places are US territories and because the values are inflated. Secondly, could you be a little more specific with your objections? I changed thirty-eighth to 38th, and changed 10 to ten. Are there any more serious objections that are preventing this from becoming an FA? I am getting a little annoyed how long this is taking. Hurricanehink (talk) 17:47, 31 August 2007 (UTC)
      • The boundary is nine/10, not ten/11. Remove "USD" (MOS). 71-year-old woman". First caption inadequate. Shouldn't have to hit the info page to know who produced the pathway of the storm, what the colours mean, and the sample frequency (i.e., 6 hrs per dot?). That's basic to understanding it. 22 feet is ... how many metres? Is 1 m really closest to 4 ft? Sorry to harp on, but measurements are central to this topic. Tony 05:04, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
        • This is ridiculous. This has been on FAC for 30 some days, and you're still objecting to missing measurements and MOS oddities. For what it's worth, I added the number of meters of 22 feet, and yes, 4 feet (the original number) is 1.2 m, which is closer to 1 m when using 1 significant figure (based on the original measurement). However, I'd like to remind that FA's are not perfect; even if they have the star, there will always be things that can be added (hence being part of a Wiki). So, if this needs to be "perfect" to become an FA, and by being "perfect" I mean omitting USD's (which should be kept for inflation numbers and because not everyone knows it's a US article), changing the caption (which is a template used in 400 odd storm articles, of which 29 are featured articles), and whatever else you can think of, then should I just withdraw it? Hurricanehink (talk) 23:30, 2 September 2007 (UTC)
        • "Shouldn't have to hit the info page to know who produced the pathway of the storm, what the colours mean, and the sample frequency (i.e., 6 hrs per dot?)" - um, that's what the image pages are for: to provide attribution and expanded information. I would object to expanding the caption, as it is not necessary. Titoxd(?!? - cool stuff) 00:45, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.