Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2013 global cold wave


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. The WP:SYNTH votes have it, through weight of argument.&mdash;Kww(talk) 16:17, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

2013 global cold wave

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This article is original research. It combines information about a number of areas that experienced lower than average temperatures and uses that to state that there is a global cold wave. I've only found one external source describing a global cold wave, and that is from 2010. Some of the sources in this article refer to global cooling going on, but it is not being reported in mainstream media. Ryan Vesey 02:35, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Rename: Well it was a winter with an unusual confluence of extreme weather events. But I don't know that it's "officially" a global effect; after all there was a record heat wave in Australia. The title decidedly smacks of OR, so perhaps a rename is in order. I'd suggest a rename to a more neutral title like 'Winter 2012 extreme weather events'. Praemonitus (talk) 03:09, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Rename as per Praemonitus. The title is OR, but the unusual cold in many part of the world is surely linked in people's minds.  It should have a descriptive title, not one which names the "event" - something like "Winter 2012–13 Northern Hemisphere cold spells" (notice the "s" which avoids tying the individual events into a widespread phenomenon). --ThaddeusB (talk) 03:40, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Keep I have no opinion on the title, but the topic seems to be notable as shown by the National Geographic article on it. Borock (talk) 03:42, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Keep, but rename. The event was reported by various major sources, is still occurring as of April 4 and can be verified further, in addition to the references currently provided in the article. Brandmeistertalk  08:25, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Delete unless at least one, and preferably more than one, meteorological source can be found which discusses this phenomenon. Also, please note that 'currently cold in a lot of places' is not the same as 'global cooling'. Any article about this phenomenon needs to reflect the distinction between seasonal variation and climatic change correctly. AlexTiefling (talk) 11:21, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The article has been recently renamed to reflect the situation better. Brandmeistertalk  14:12, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * It still looks like an original synthesis. AlexTiefling (talk) 15:37, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The "cold wave" bit needs to be dropped or it is still an OR title. --ThaddeusB (talk)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Environment-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 18:14, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 18:14, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of News-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 18:14, 4 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Delete. The problem with this article is that it takes lots of different news stories, that may or may not be due to the "global cold wave", and links them together. Many of these articles give no reference to any global cold wave whatsoever. The compilation of these incidents may very well constitute original research. —♦♦ AMBER  (ЯʘCK)  19:53, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * See for example NASA statement, Climate Central and AccuWeather. The event is nearly uniform in Northern Hemisphere and isn't a mere coincidence of bad weather conditions. Brandmeistertalk  21:35, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * You may be right. But the problem is: we're not a scientific journal. We're an encyclopedia. It's not up to us to link all these individual events and stitch a story together. Our job is to write reports about the stories already out there. Your last reply convinced me even more that this page constitutes original research. —♦♦ AMBER  (ЯʘCK)  23:46, 4 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Nothing is stitched here. A weather condition marked by low temperatures or a period of weather colder than normal or a spell of cold weather over a wide area are called a cold wave and this is what the reliable sources (including those in the article) report up until now. Brandmeistertalk  00:09, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The OR concern can be fixed merely by renaming: "2013 Northern Hemisphere cold weather events", "2013 Northern Hemisphere cold spells" ,or something similar. There is nothing wrong with discussing "related" cold spells as long is not an attempt to say they arepart of a single phenomenon. --ThaddeusB (talk)
 * I'm not really in favour of that idea either. How encyclopedic is that? Are we going to list all the events from when it was cold and when it was warm for every year?  —♦♦ AMBER  (ЯʘCK)  07:03, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Many major events of similar scale are there, see Category:Cold waves. Brandmeistertalk  09:39, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
 * We're not discussing those articles. We're discussing this one. —♦♦ AMBER  (ЯʘCK)  10:07, 5 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Keep. Google quickly shows a lot of "cold waves" reported for many countries in 2013. So far the general article OK under descriptive title (unless you want a bunch or articles "2013 cold wave in the US, 2013 cold wave in India, 2013 cold wave in Russia, 2013 cold wave in Uzbekistan,...etc. etc. )  But it is only a matter of time when someone publishes a global summary. Staszek Lem (talk) 17:15, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
 * When and if they do, we can consider basing an article on it. At present, this still looks like an original synthesis. AlexTiefling (talk) 13:18, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The event has been already confirmed by Phys.org, NASA (Many parts of the Northern Hemisphere saw near record-breaking cool temperatures as the value of the AO fell) and other RS that are in the article. Brandmeistertalk  17:11, 8 April 2013 (UTC)


 * delete (vote changed). I was confused by my own argument: as of today the article is WP:SYNTH, since no sources discuss this as a global phenomenon. At best, it may be split into articles per country, to be merged later, when the 'global phenomenon' will be discussed as such. Staszek Lem (talk) 16:12, 11 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Keep. Worlwide events. Reliable sources are present. NickSt (talk) 23:41, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Delete Google will always find sources for a cold wave in any given year in many countries, because at some point in the year the weather is almost certain to be for at least a few days colder than expected. Staszek Lem is thus correct that an article could be written with this title if one takes the sources at face value, not just for 2013 but for 2012, 2011,... -- and similarly  for heat wave. The question of whether this particular winter was outside the normal range of variation is an interesting one, but the very nature of probability distribution means that some events will be outside the usual distribution without it implying significance.  Now, it may be the case that this was indeed so anomalous that it is a real phenomenon. But the sort of material reported here does not prove it, and using it is a blatant example of synthesis.  It's perhaps time we started using something like MEDRES in all fields of science. The content is also biased, and does not represent the content. There are quotes in the article about how this represented a "little iIce Age." there are not quotes found prominently in the sources referred to above, that this is one of the manifestations of general global warming. (though there is one taken from the sole scientific source used, albeit popular science, that it is the effect of melting sea ice.)
 * I normally do not !vote for deleting an article because I disagree with the content chosen for inclusion, because that is normally fixable. I normally do not !vote for deletion for an article where the title implies bias, because that too can be fixed--I think the correct title would be World climate in 2013. (and similarly for other years) Weather is one of the concerns of an almanac, and WP contains such elements of an almanac. too the extent the bias is promotion of a cause, it can be fixed like most promotionalism. But some promotionalism is unfixable, and requires removing the article and its history, and starting from scratch. That's the case here. The very first sentence proves it: it is considered worthy of note that is was cold, beginning in January in the Northern Hemisphere! All of the individual city weather reports are inappropriate content because they are meaningless for a general question without using WP:SYNTHESIS,  people's inexpert opinions are the entire content.  What is needed is reports of scientific analysis.  DGG ( talk ) 04:57, 11 April 2013 (UTC)
 * I think you're still mixing the issue of notability with the issue of the article's title. The notability in my view is clearly established, particularly considering multiple sourced weather records. The issue you're actually raising is about the event's connection to the ice loss and the extent of the phenomenon, both of which are fixable. As I wrote above, the article does include NASA Earth Observatory reference, that is clearly about the event and explains why it has occurred. The article just mentions opinions and doesn't promote any particular view (and even if it actually does, it's still fixable). The Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research also wrote that how this might be linked to global warming was shown by a study by PIK scientist Vladimir Petoukhov in 2010 already. You can start the thread to rename the article to 2013 Northern Hemisphere weather events or any other title, which eliminates any perceived synthesis. Brandmeistertalk  15:53, 11 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.