Wikipedia:WikiProject Severe weather/Newsletter/Archive 1

{| class="plainlinks" The WikiProject Severe weather Newsletter Vol. I, No. 1, Issue 1, February 2008 If you would like to delete this message, the original is at WikiProject Severe weather/Newsletter/February 2008
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Welcome
Welcome to the first monthly issue of the WikiProject Severe weather newsletter! In this issue, we will welcome you to the newsletter, and give you an idea of what the project is about, what it has done, and what it plans to do. So, enjoy reading the February 2008 issue! If you have not signed up to receive the newsletter, you may do so at the newsletter page. If you do not sign up, you will not receive the next newsletter!

New project articles

 * Marion, Illinois Tornado Outbreak- Featured as a "Did you know" article on the Main Page
 * List of May 2003 Tornado Outbreak Sequence tornadoes (split from the main article)
 * 2008 Vancouver tornado- Details the recent abnormal tornado in Vancouver, Washington
 * Barneveld, Wisconsin tornado outbreak- Details a destructive tornado outbreak that hit areas of Wisconsin in 1984.
 * January 2008 Tornado Outbreak Sequence-Details the recent tornado outbreak (see section below)

Featured story
This featured story focuses on the relative WikiWork for this project. The relative WikiWork is the measure of how lose a project is to having every article featured. It is a complex calculation;

ω = a + 2g + 3b + 4s + 5t

where a is A-class articles, g is GA-class articles, b is B-class articles, s is start-class articles, and t is stub-class articles.

Thus, the closer you are to 0 (zero), the closer you are to having every article featured. The WikiWork number for every class is added, then divided by the number of articles, similar to averaging, and it is found that the relative WikiWork for this project is Ω = 4.182. Ω is a symbol for the relative WikiWork factor. That is not the best number, as we are closer to 5 than we are to 0, and we are very close to 5. This means that the majority of the articles in the project are either stub, or start. That is what we need to change. So, while more severe weather articles are good, we should try not to publish as many stub class, and fewer start class articles.

Members section
New members User:Juliancolton (Talk) The most recent user to join the project, but is very active. User:Juliancolton is also an editor of this newsletter.

Featured member User:CrazyC83 is this month's featured member for WikiProject Severe weather. (The following text is from User:JForget's nomination.) User:CrazyC83 - One of the most active (if not the most) members in recent tornado activity coverage and monitoring. Recent examples of this includes the February-March 2007 Tornado Outbreak in Alabama and Missouri, the May 2007 Tornado Outbreak in Kansas and Oklahoma and the January 2008 Tornado Outbreak Sequence in Missouri, Wisconsin, Arkansas, Mississippi and Alabama. Had also made coverage in non-article tornado events such as the New Orleans tornado event on February 13, 2007 and the tornado event associated with the Superstorm of December 16, 2007. User:CrazyC83 made numerous edits, more than one hundred, to 2008 Super Tuesday tornado outbreak.

Significant storms
Significant storms last month included the outbreak in the United States in early to mid-January that produced 71 tornadoes and killed three people. Several tornado emergencies were issued in association with supercells during this outbreak. This outbreak was very similar to a classic spring severe weather outbreak, but extending farther north than even most late season outbreaks. The hardest hit areas on January 7 were the Springfield, Missouri metropolitan area and areas immediately to the north of Chicago, three people were killed near Springfield throughout the Southwestern Missouri Ozarks. On January 8, my area, the Tri-State region of Evansville, Indiana, was hit with the tornado outbreak. Only a few funnel clouds were reported in my area. Most tornadoes of the day were confined to the Memphis, Tennessee area and Eastern Arkansas, where one person was killed. On January 9 only a few wind and hail reports were received. On January 10, however, the action started back up. More tornadic storms developed across the Southern United States, including several significant storms that produced tornadoes. These tornadoes severely damaged rual towns in Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. The most notable of these tornadoes was reported in Lamar County, Alabama where 1 person was injured as several buildings were destroyed in this EF-3 tornado.

Five more deaths (three by tornadoes and two by straight-line winds) were reported on January 29 from a series of scattered tornadoes and a serial derecho across the Ohio Valley stretching south into Arkansas.