Draft:Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Weather events

This page contains an in-depth guide to writing clear, informative, encyclopedic, and attractive articles on weather events. This guide complements the general Manual of Style.

General

Usually, MOS:ENGVAR and MOS:DATEVAR applies. If a specific English-speaking nation has a connection to a weather event, such as when all affected nations use a common format, that event's article should use the nation's English variety and date format.

Tornadoes

Ratings

Tornado ratings, such as on the Enhanced Fujita scale, should be treated as adjectives. Ratings should not be used as nouns.

N The tornado entered Springfield as an EF4.

Y The tornado entered Springfield at EF4 intensity.

N The tornado was rated as an EF4.

Y The tornado was rated EF4.

N ...including an EF4 that struck Springfield.

Y ...including an EF4 tornado that struck Springfield.

Structure

Lead

The lead should begin with a date and include basic information on the tornado like the intensity, location, and damages associated. In general, the name of the title should not be used as the boldfaced name of the tornado to prevent edit warring. Per MOS:DATE, introduce the date with the year attached.

Example leads:

N A large tornado called the 1997 Jarrell tornado would produce heavy damage across portions of the Jarrell area. The tornado killed many residents of the town, many in a single subdivision, and inflicted $40 million in damages in its 5-mile track. It occurred as part of a tornado outbreak across Texas and it was produced by a supercell that developed from rotation.

Y On May 27, 1997, a large tornado produced catastrophic damage across portions of the Jarrell, Texas area. The tornado killed 27 residents of the town, many in a single subdivision, and inflicted approximately $40 million (1997 USD) in damages in its 13-minute, 5.1 miles (8.2 km) track. It occurred as part of a tornado outbreak across central Texas; it was produced by a supercell that had developed from an unstable airmass and favorable meteorological conditions at the time, including high convective available potential energy (CAPE) values and warm dewpoints.

Meteorological synopsis

The meteorological synopsis section should cover the context and origin of a tornado. Like in the lead, date and location should be given. There should be a {{main}} hatnote below the heading linking to the outbreak that the tornado was apart of.

Tropical cyclones

All categories of tropical cyclone intensity scales should include a non-breaking space within and be capitalized. Numerical categories of tropical cyclone intensity scales, such as those of the Saffir–Simpson scale, should be used to describe a noun except when brevity is necessary (e.g. tables, infoboxes).

• N Hurricane Whitney made landfall as a Category 5.
• Y Hurricane Whitney made landfall as a Category 5 hurricane.
• Y Hurricane Whitney made landfall at Category 5 strength.

Structure

Articles should typically include Level 2 headings for the storm's meteorological history, preparations, impact, and aftermath, in chronological order. Articles with extensive coverage should use separate headings for each section. If content is limited, its effects–preparations, impact, and aftermath–can be condensed into one heading.

Lead

The lead should open by qualifying some notable aspects of a tropical cyclone used in reliable sources. These qualifiers can include strength (moderately strong, powerful), movement (long-lived, erratic), or destruction (destructive, catastrophic). Avoid more than three used. The first sentence should also include the month that the tropical cyclone occurred. Following the first sentence should be the ordinality of the tropical cyclone.

Hurricane Whitney was a powerful and destructive tropical cyclone that formed in September 1730. The twenty-first named storm, eleventh hurricane, and third major hurricane of the 1730 Atlantic hurricane season, Whitney...

Infobox

For individual tropical cyclone articles, always use Template:Infobox weather event.

Lead image

The lead image should always be in the infobox. The image should show the storm near or exactly at its highest maximum sustained winds or tropical cyclone intensity scale category, regardless of the minimum pressure, determined by their respective Regional Specialized Meteorological Centers. The cyclone's structure should be fully shown. Images with visible borders or nearby landmasses are preferred, provided they don't significantly interfere with the tropical cyclone's appearance. Avoid using images containing latitude-longitude grids or areas with no data. Avoid collages in the lead section primarily due to complications with selection, scope, clutter, and access to images.

The lead image should be a high-resolution true-color visible image if appropriate. Otherwise, use visible imagery overlaid on a true-color basemap, followed by infrared imagery overlaid on a true-color basemap, false-color visible imagery, grayscale visible or infrared imagery, and false-color infrared imagery.

If no satellite imagery can be found at or near peak intensity, satellite imagery at some point of meteorological significance such as landfall or closest approach to land should be used, following the order of precedence above. Satellite imagery from other points in a storm's lifetime can be used, so long as they are still somewhat representative of the storm (for example, an image of a super typhoon as a tropical depression should not be used). Otherwise, either surface analyses of the system at or near peak or its impacts should be used. If satellite imagery cannot be found, surface analyses of the system at or near peak or its impacts should be used. If there are no image of the storm or its impacts, its track should be used as the infobox image. This will typically be track images generated using the WPTC track generator, but may also be unofficial tracks from studies such as those associated with tropical cyclones outside official track databases. If there is no picture of the storm or its impacts, a relevant map of an affected area can be used as the infobox image.

Meteorological history

The meteorological history should include Template:Storm path using the map colors approved in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Weather/Colour discussions#Modification whenever possible. The template is typically positioned on the left. Any times listed in this section should be in UTC.

Any material relating to climate change belongs here, often separated into a subsection.

Preparations

The preparations section includes actions taken before a storm's impacts. Generally, affected areas should be ordered chronologically. Any regions that would consist of a very small paragraph should be merged into other subsections if appropriate. Otherwise, create a subsection at the end titled Elsewhere, or Other states if a subsection in the United States has its own subsections. If any times are used in this section, the timezone should be added.

The preparations should begin with watches and warnings issued for a given region.

Impact

The impact section details the storm's effects on people, the environment, and the economy. As with the preparations section, affected areas should be ordered chronologically and small subsections should be merged into other sections. If any times are used in this section, the timezone should be added.

Aftermath

This section discusses the recovery process of a tropical cyclone. Relief donations and long-term effects are topics that can be included in this section.

See also

Articles with a see also section should include links to related articles. Links to stand-alone lists are preferred, as they help reduce overcrowding and minimize confusion over connections. As with other articles, see also sections are not required. See also sections that consistently attract controversy and unproductive edits may be removed. These sections should be ordered as follows, assuming neither of the following links are repeated in the article:

• Weather of (year)
• Tropical cyclones in (year)
• Other storms named Y
• List of hurricanes in (location)

Naming conventions

As most of the basins have cyclical naming lists and only retire names in some circumstances, there is likely to be several storms of the same name. In this case, WP:PRIMARYTOPIC applies. All instances of a storm having a given name should be considered on some level as classes of storm can overlap, like hurricanes and typhoons maturing from tropical storms and tropical cyclones being a general term for most tropical systems. Intensity alone is not an indication of a primary topic, though it can help in some cases.

Tropical cyclones should use the category of their most mature state (i.e., hurricane or typhoon status should be used before tropical storm, which should be used before tropical depression). Tropical cyclones that matured from subtropical systems should use the tropical class given even if the system was more intense as a subtropical system. Extratropical systems that changed into tropical systems can retain the name of their extratropical phase like October 2021 nor'easter.

In the Northwest Pacific, PAGASA names storms in the Philippine Area of Responsibility. International names issued by the JMA should be used when possible.