Talk:Sherpa Fire/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: Midnightblueowl (talk · contribs) 15:34, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

This is an article on a subject with which I am completely unfamiliar, but I'll give it a review regardless (and hopefully learn something in the process!). Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:34, 9 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Lede:
 * ✅Mention where "Santa Barbara County" actually is (i.e. in California, southwestern United States). Remember that many non-American readers will not be at all familiar with U.S. geography any more than most American readers will be familiar with Chinese geography etc. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:39, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"exploded" seems a little dramatic and non-technical. "spread" should do the job just fine. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:39, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * In some respects I feel that he lede could do a better job summarising the article's contents. For instance, it doesn't mention anything about the wildfire's name or the efforts that were made to counter it. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:55, 9 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Events
 * ✅"Exploded" appears again. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:39, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"According the the"? Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:39, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"Forest Service" might be better written as "United States Forest Service". Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:39, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"down the canyons"? What canyons are these? Any links? Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:39, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * unfortunately no links to specific canyons, but how does "...fire down canyons in the Santa Ynez Mountains with gusts of..." sound? Gives more context.-- Zackmann08 (Talk to me/What I been doing) 20:31, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * That sounds good to me. Midnightblueowl (talk) 21:26, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"as it continued to spread.[2] As the fire continued"... "continued... continued". Fairly repetitive. I'd change one of them. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Down to only 2 occurrences of "continued" and they are 3 paragraphs apart. -- Zackmann08 (Talk to me/What I been doing) 20:31, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"as well as a livestock evacuation center as the" - "as...as...as". Again, it's a little repetitive. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Cut a number of occurrences in the text. How does it look now? -- Zackmann08 (Talk to me/What I been doing) 20:31, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Looks good. Midnightblueowl (talk) 21:38, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"Thursday evening the sundowner winds resurfaced" - "On Thursday" might be a clearer way of introducing this sentence. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * My one concern with this is that the sundowner winds ONLY surfaced in the evening so it is important to emphasise that point and "On Thursday evening..." sounds weird to me. Thoughts? -- Zackmann08 (Talk to me/What I been doing) 20:31, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I still think that opening a sentence with "Thursday evening" is inappropriate. How about "On the evening of Thursday 16..." ? Midnightblueowl (talk) 21:38, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"On June 27th" and later dates. we haven't been using "th" or "st" at the end of dates earlier in the article so we probably shouldn't have it here. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * ✅"In the following weeks, Santa Barbara County Fire Department responded to multiple small flares up within the fire ground." This isn't referenced and could be considered WP:Original Research. If you can't find a reliable source to bolster this claim then I would suggest scrapping it. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * You're good. TOTALLY guilty of WP:OR with that statement.-- Zackmann08 (Talk to me/What I been doing) 20:31, 10 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Effects
 * ✅As a standalone section, this doesn't really work. Given that this consists of just three lone sentences, I would consider merging them all into the "Events" section at the appropriate junctures. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I have enlarged the section adding more content and sources. Thoughts? -- Zackmann08 (Talk to me/What I been doing) 21:12, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
 * Looks fine to me. Midnightblueowl (talk) 21:38, 10 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Name
 * ✅ This has a duplink to United States Forestry Service. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * I wonder if this section would work better at the start, before the "Events" section. Just a suggestion, don't worry if you disagree. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)


 * The sources all look fine, however I would definitely recommend getting some web archive links in too, lest the ones you currently use become deadlinks over the next few years. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)
 * The images look fine. Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

There are quite a few prose issues here with I fear conflict with "1a. the prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct" but those can be cleared up without too much difficulty. Beyond that I am generally happy that this article meets the GA criteria and can be passed (so long as the prose edits are dealt with). Midnightblueowl (talk) 15:53, 9 August 2016 (UTC)


 * Comment: The Gallery section appears to be a fairly random assortment of images WP:IG, Template:Cleanup-gallery. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:27, 9 August 2016 (UTC)

Just the one last point, regarding "Thursday evening", Zackmann08. After that is sorted I Will be happy to pass this article as a GA. Midnightblueowl (talk) 12:29, 12 August 2016 (UTC)


 * thanks again for your help on this! Should be good to go based on your notes. -- Zackmann08 (Talk to me/What I been doing) 17:24, 12 August 2016 (UTC)