The Hurricane Herald is the arbitrarily periodical newsletter of WikiProject Tropical Cyclones. The newsletter aims to provide in summary the recent activities and developments of the WikiProject, in addition to global tropical cyclone activity. The Hurricane Herald has been running since its first edition ran on June 4, 2006; it has been almost thirteen years since that time. If you wish to receive or discontinue subscription to this newsletter, please visit the mailing list. This issue of The Hurricane Herald covers all project related events from June 1–July 31, 2019. This edition's editor and author is ♫ Hurricanehink (talk) .

Please visit this page and bookmark any suggestions of interest to you. This will help improve the newsletter and other cyclone-related articles. Past editions can be viewed here.

Storm of the month and other tropical activity

Hurricane Barry was the wettest tropical storm on record in Arkansas, and one of only four hurricanes to strike Louisiana in July. Originating from a trough over the southeastern United States, Barry formed on July 11 off the southeast Louisiana coast. Despite wind shear and an asymmetrical structure, the storm intensified into a minimal hurricane before making landfall near Intracoastal City, Louisiana. Barry dropped heavy rainfall from the Gulf of Mexico to the Ohio Valley, peaking at 23.43 in (595 mm) near Ragley, Louisiana. The storm caused flooding rains, power outages, and one death due to rip currents. Damage totaled over US$500 million.

• The Atlantic hurricane season, and the Central Pacific hurricane season, began on June 1. The 2019-20 tropical cyclone year in the Southern Hemisphere began on July 1 in the South-West Indian Ocean, Australian region, and South Pacific.
• Since the last newsletter, 18 other systems have formed worldwide, in addition to Barry.
• Western Pacific

  In the Western Pacific, Tropical Storm Sepat in June passed near Japan and was classified as a subtropical storm by the JTWC. In early July, Tropical Storm Mun killed two people when it struck Vietnam. Tropical Storm Danas formed near the Philippines and moved northward, later crossing the Korean peninsula. Toward the end of July, Tropical Storm Nari moved across Japan as a tropical depression, and Tropical Storm Wipha struck southern China. There were also three tropical depressions, one of which the JTWC classified as a tropical storm.

• Eastern Pacific

  After the latest start of a hurricane season since 1971, activity in the basin began on June 25 when Hurricane Alvin formed off the southwest coast of Mexico. Hurricane Barbara became a strong Category 4 hurricane, and its remnants later caused power outages in Hawaii. Tropical Storm Cosme, Tropical Depression Four-E, Tropical Storm Dalila, and hurricanes Erick, and Flossie also formed in July southwest of Mexico.

• Atlantic

  Short-lived Tropical Depression Three formed near the Bahamas and dissipated east of Florida in late July

• North Indian Ocean

• Cyclone Vayu was a powerful cyclone that threatened western India, but stalled and weakened significantly before moving ashore. The storm killed eight people, and lashed western India with heavy rainfall and high tides.

• South-West Indian Ocean

• In late July, Zone of Disturbed Weather 01 lasted for a few days east of Madagascar in the southern hemisphere winter.

Member of the month (edition) – TheAustinMan

TheAustinMan has been involved with WPTC since 2009. Since the last newsletter, TheAustinMan worked on the Storm of the Month (Barry), as well as 1915 Galveston hurricane, Typhoon Alice (1979), 1937 Atlantic hurricane season, 1944 Jamaica hurricane, and the 1944 Cuba–Florida hurricane. A prolific editor, TheAustinMan has contributed to three featured articles and 46 good articles. Thank you for your contributions!

New WikiProject Members since the last newsletter in June/July 2019

• DavidTheMeteorologist (talk · contribs)
• ThePacificMan (talk · contribs)

To our new members: welcome to the project, and happy editing! Feel free to check the to-do list at the bottom right of the newsletter for things that you might want to work on. To our veteran members: thank you for your edits and your tireless contributions!

Current assessment table

Assessments valid as of this printing. Depending on when you may be viewing this newsletter, the table may be outdated. See here for the latest, most up to date statistics.
As of this issue, there are 152 featured articles and 70 featured lists. There are 142 A-class articles, but that number is subject to change, depending if we mandate that all A-class articles have an A-class review first. There are 961 good articles, meaning it is possible we get to our 1000th GA by the end of the year. There are only 62 B-class articles, perhaps because because most articles of that quality already passed a GA review. There are 363 C-class articles, 717 start-class articles, and 141 stub-class articles, with 26 lists and 9 current articles. The number of lists may decrease further as the "Tropical cyclone X" articles continue to be reclassified as set index articles. These figures mean that more than half of the project is rated a GA or better - including the lists/current/future articles, there are 1283 articles that are below GA status, versus 1325 that are GA or better.

About the assessment scale →

Sourcing guidelines, by TheAustinMan

The core content policies on Wikipedia (neutral point of view, no original research, and verifiability) all apply to articles tagged by WikiProject Tropical cyclones. The project's style guidelines also provide information on how to cite sources effectively. Relevant guidelines discussing the WikiProject's tropical meteorology articles may also be found at WP:SCICITE and WP:SCIRS.

Reports, bulletins, and other products issued by Regional Specialized Meteorological Centers are the authoritative source on meteorological information pertaining to tropical cyclones in their respective basins. This includes both quantitative and qualitative information about a storm's characteristics, including intensities, durations, and locations. The most recent post-storm assessments take precedence over operational data. Thus, post-season revisions to a storm's "best track" file, new information presented in a tropical cyclone report, or official database adjustments made by the Atlantic hurricane reanalysis project, or other official reanalyses supersede operational information where they disagree. Data in operational RSMC products can still be used if later data does not dispute them. Information from other public agencies can also be used, but generally require in-text attribution. While the original best track data from meteorological agencies is a reliable source and can be referenced, readers often find difficulty interpreting them. Consider using IBTrACS, a more easily understandable track database, which is endorsed by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), for this information. Because the Automated Tropical Cyclone Forecasting System (ATCF) used by the Joint Typhoon Warning Center and National Hurricane Center is liable to change frequently in realtime, they should not be used for currently active storms. Forecasts from these agencies and RSMCs should only be used to cite the forecasts themselves; in other words, they can only be used to describe what was expected to occur, and never to describe what did occur.

Maps and other graphics published by meteorological agencies may be used to describe events (see the associated essay). However, they should only be referenced if they are explicit in conveying the supported information and do not require any rigorous meteorological interpretation (such as satellite analysis or drawing conclusions over what the arrangement of meteorological features represents). In general, self-published sources should not be used as sources for present or historical storm intensities. However, information contained in articles from reliable sources or commentary from established tropical cyclone experts can be used as sources for information not covered by WMO-endorsed agencies. If such sources dispute WMO-endorsed meteorological data, commentary on the disputed information may be used, making sure to attribute claims and giving due weight.

Storm effects are typically referenced with a wide array of published sources. These may include news organizations, risk assessment organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGO), government agencies, and impact databases. So long as they are reliable sources, they can be used as references for tropical cyclone impacts. Note that figures from early impact reports, often disseminated by the first NGO situation reports and news reports, may quickly be outdated in light of newer information. When sourcing damage totals or casualty figures, use the most recent value from a reliable source, as these values tend to be more stable and use more up-to-date information. If such figures are disputed by other reliable sources, this should be noted in the article, making sure to attribute claims and giving due weight. Routine calculations of damage and casualty figures (for instance, adding casualties from different countries) are acceptable as long as they arise from reliable sources.

Latest WikiProject Alerts

The following are the latest article developments as updated by AAlertBot, as of the publishing of this issue. Due to the bot workings, some of these updates may seem out of place; nonetheless, they are included here.

Updated daily by AAlertBot — Discuss? / Report bug? / Request feature?
Click to watch (Subscribe via  RSS  Atom) · Find Article Alerts for other topics!

From the Main Page

From the Main Page documents WikiProject related materials that have appeared on the main page from April 14–May 31, 2019 in chronological order.

Today's Featured Article

• June 11 - Cyclone Raja
• July 2 - 1991 Atlantic hurricane season
• July 16 - Timeline of the 2012 Pacific hurricane season

Did you know...?

• June 5 - Effects of Hurricane Floyd in Florida
• June 24 - 1826 Canary Islands storm

History of WikiProject Tropical cyclones

The article for hurricane (tropical cyclone) was created on December 2, 2001. On October 3, 2002, User:Ed Poor created an article for Hurricane Lili while the storm was active and near peak intensity; since then, 163 other people have edited the article to help make it a . In March 2004, User:BigT27 created an article for the hyperactive 1995 Atlantic hurricane season, then the 3rd most-active Atlantic hurricane season on record. On August 14 of that year, an article was created for Hurricane Iniki, the first non-Atlantic storm, and on August 31, the 1900 Galveston hurricane became the first TC-related . On October 4, 2004, Cyclone Tracy became featured, which was the 2nd FA in the project. A week later, User:Golbez created the article for 2004 Pacific hurricane season, which was the first season article for the EPAC.

On May 19, 2005, User:Tom created Template:Infobox Hurricane, which standardized the infobox that appears in every storm article. On July 20, User:Skywayman created the article for the 2005 Pacific typhoon season, which became the third basin to get season articles. On July 31, User:Holderca1 created the article for 2004-05 Southern Hemisphere tropical cyclone season – for the first several years on Wikipedia, the SHEM was handled in a singular article, but was split into SWIO, AUS, and SPAC beginning on April 16, 2007, and finished on April 21, 2013. During the hyperactive 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, articles were created quickly for the most powerful storms, including Hurricane Dennis which quickly became an FA.

On August 26, 2005, User:CrazyC83 created an article for Hurricane Katrina after the legendary storm crossed over southern Florida. By two days later, there were 500 edits to the article, and the hurricane was threatening to hit New Orleans as a Category 4 or 5. We now know it was “only” a Category 3 at landfall. In the 14 years since Katrina, there have been 6,327 editors to the Hurricane Katrina article, along with 23 sub-articles. During the 2005 season, there were debates among editors whether lesser notable storms, like Hurricane Cindy (2005), should have articles. At one point in 2006, there were articles for every named storm during the 2005 AHS, but in the 13 years since then, articles for tropical storms Franklin, Harvey, and Lee, and Philippe were created and merged. As a way to coordinate edits among the tropical cyclone pages, User:Jdorje created Template:Hurricane on September 12, 2005. This is the same template that appears on the talk pages for every article in the WPTC. On October 5, Jdorje officially created WP:WPTC, the tropical cyclone WikiProject. That October, in quick succession, the Atlantic hurricane seasons reached back to the beginning of recordkeeping (before 1600s) due to a collaboration of several editors; User:RattleMan created the first season article for the North Indian Ocean; User:Miss Madeline successfully nominated List of California hurricanes for featured list; and Jdorje created a a standardized storm path template.

In 2006, a series of users improved articles worldwide to featured article status. Professional met David Roth joined the project, and in the same year, the NOAA and NHC copied some material from Wikipedia, including track maps, and the Tropical Cyclone Report for Tropical Storm Chris (2006). In June 2006, User:Nilfanion created the project assessment page, which documents the status of every article, organized by basin, the year, and storm shaded by the quality. On August 1, the chat room on IRC for the project was created, which allowed real-time communication among editors. There’s something special about conversing with fellow weather geeks during an epic storm, which seems to have become all the more common. On January 1, 2007, the number of good articles in the project reached 100. On January 29th, a collaboration of users made the List of retired Pacific hurricane names the first featured topic in the project. It was joined by the 2003 Atlantic hurricane season in March 2007.

In 2008, further collaborations helped make the article for tropical cyclone a featured article, one of 100 FA’s in the project. Notably among project members, Tropical Storm Erick (2007) became featured on December 14, 2008. The storm lasted for a short amount of time over open waters, and as such, it was the shortest featured article anywhere on Wikipedia. Users questioned whether the storm was notable enough to have such a detailed article, but the article described the storm in articulate detail. After an AFD and two featured article review (and a series of low-notability storms being merged), Erick was delisted as a featured article on March 2, 2013. In the period from 2008 to 2013, users created task forces for various basins, articles for all of the seasons in the Atlantic and EPAC, and enough high-quality articles that more than half of all storm/season articles were good or featured articles. In January 2008, there were 1000 articles in the entire project. On January 1, 2014, User:Yellow Evan created Typhoon Nancy (1982), which was the 2000th article in the project. In October 2008, there were 100 FA’s in the project, which reached 200 on November 28, 2015, with Hurricane Fay (2014). By March 2016, every basin had at least 100 storm articles, multiple featured articles, and season articles of various quality.

Featured Content

This section lists content that have become featured, articles and lists, since the past newsletter in mid-April 2019.
From June 1–July 31, 2019, one featured article and one featured list was promoted:

• Hurricane Rosa (2018)
• Timeline of the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season
• Hurricane Alex (2016) is up at FAC

WikiProject Tropical Cyclones: News & Developments

• An awards program for the project began on May 31. It involves 25 levels that may be gained by earning points for completing various actions such as getting good or featured articles. Additional awards will be added in the future.
• In June 2019, the most popular article in the project was Cyclone Fani, viewed 139,696 times during the month. The generic cyclone was 2nd most popular, with 91,890 views. In 3rd place was the 2019 Atlantic hurricane season with 90,741 views, followed by Hurricane Katrina with 78,591 views. Included in the top 20 were the 2019 season articles for EPAC, WPAC, and NIO, TFA Cyclone Raja, 2018 and 19 Atlantic hurricane seasons, hurricanes Michael, Harvey, Maria, and Sandy. In July 2019, Hurricane Barry (2019) was viewed 85,793 times, with a peak on the day after the storm moved ashore.
• The most-viewed stub-class article in the project is List of Louisiana hurricanes (2000–present). The most-viewed start-class article is 2018 Atlantic hurricane season.

New articles since the last newsletter include:

• Effects of Hurricane Floyd in North Carolina
• Effects of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico
• List of Eastern Pacific tropical storms (2000–present)
• List of Category 5 South Pacific severe tropical cyclones
• 1875 Indianola hurricane
• 1931 Pacific typhoon season
• 1944 Jamaica hurricane

New GA's include:

• 1944 Cuba–Florida hurricane
• 1994 Bangladesh cyclone
• 2017 Atlantic hurricane season
• Cyclone Nora

WikiProject To-Do