Talk:West Fertilizer Company explosion/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Memorial service

Obama attended a memorial service; cause still unknown.[1] John Vandenberg ^(chat) 04:12, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Politifact, might have something useful

[2] Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:54, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Bryce Reed

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=West_Fertilizer_Company_explosion&diff=554629089&oldid=554628176

We had a bit about Bryce Reed. Could this be included? Is it OR? The lack of connection was noted by several sources. It may not be reasonable to include it, but it may be necessary. --beefyt (talk) 05:13, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Any connection between the arrest and the explosion at this point is purely speculative. A spokeswoman for the Texas State Fire Marshal's Office has directly stated that there was no link between the arrest and the explosion - [3] If that changes at some point, and law enforcement identifies him as being suspected of causing the explosion, we can add it at that point.

Obviously it certainly looks bad and suspicious and all that, but it could simply be a horrifying coincidence. We should let law enforcement do their investigation and leave the speculation out. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 03:38, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Sure. We can wait for a while until official investigations come to a possible conclusion. You are right. It might be just a coincidence. werldwayd (talk) 04:13, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

The relevant policy can be found at WP:BLPCRIME. In particular, "For people who are relatively unknown, editors must give serious consideration to not including material in any article suggesting that the person has committed, or is accused of committing, a crime unless a conviction is secured." Kafziel ^{Complaint Department: Please take a number} 13:59, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Bryce Reed is no longer unknown, his name has been reported in articles about the explosion in numerous sources. As to the speculative nature of the connection, which I grant, why does that matter? Can we not simply say, "news reports speculated a connection but law enforcement has not confirmed." That much is fact. Can we not include speculation? If not, please point to the relevant policy. --beefyt (talk) 16:49, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

I already cited the relevant policy. Obviously his name has been reported related to this incident; if it hadn't been, we wouldn't even be talking about this. But that's all he's known for, and that's not enough. Wikipedia is not news. It is not our job to report every bit of speculation in the media, and BLP prohibits needlessly dragging people through the mud. We wait and see what the conclusion is before saying anything at all. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department: Please take a number} 16:57, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

I think your point is good; I agree he is "relatively unknown". But a "reliable, expert source" of speculation per WP:SPECULATION, such as an statement by law enforcement, would trump the BLP and NOTNEWS policies. Obviously we may not synthesize our own speculation as editors. The newspaper sources generally point out the absence of formal speculation, and leave readers to speculate on their own. Since we don't have any sources of formal speculation from expert sources, I must agree that the material should be excluded. --beefyt (talk) 17:05, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Nothing trumps BLP. Police are not experts about guilt or innocence; that's why we have courts. As the policy says, we wait for an actual conviction. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department: Please take a number} 17:14, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

I agree, I see the point of excluding the material until a conviction is established. But I wonder about how we define "relatively unknown". When is that threshold crossed? It seems that Bryce Reed is relatively unknown, even though he was interviewed about the explosion before his arrest. Suppose he is accused of causing the plant to explode. You claim that we still could not include that by BLP. Why do we have a huge amount of material about Dzhokhar Tsarnaev? He is not convicted of a crime, and was relatively unknown before being accused. What is the difference? --beefyt (talk) 02:15, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

If you really can't tell the difference, then that illustrates precisely why we don't drag random people into things like this. Because a lot of other people can't tell the difference, either. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department: Please take a number} 11:22, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Casualties

Why only 14 casualties, while link says 35?? Authorities not releasing info? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.169.158.42 (talk) 02:18, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Here is a report that shows the number has gone up:

• [4]

also

• [5]

Not sure what is going on. --ḾỊḼʘɴίcả • Talk • _{I DX for fun!} 16:53, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

The second link was already used as a source in the article. But the number wasn't confirmed. As for the first link, I don't consider a site with a story title like that (one which comes with a pop-up ad that asks "Does the NRA control congress?") a reliable source for much of anything. If you have to resort to that, then clearly you're reaching pretty far. Not everything is a cover-up. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department: Please take a number} 17:07, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

I'll admit the first source is a bit bias, but as for the Los Angeles Times? I also agree we should wait until others report the same thing before pulling a CNN.--ḾỊḼʘɴίcả • Talk • _{I DX for fun!} 18:10, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

The Los Angeles Times recently had a multi-part series, entitled "Five Reasons to Stay Out of Texas this Summer," but could easily have been called "Five Reasons to Hate Texas." So, yes they can be a very biased source of info for anything relating to Texas or the South.TL36 (talk) 02:09, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

Exactly. The same quote was cited here (by CNN, in fact) but the mayor since recanted. We have to consider not only the source, but the source's source. He was in no position to make such a statement. Once something is online most of these journalists don't bother to print a retraction, because it's just "teh interwebz" so they don't care. Most of those stories will still be floating out there ten years from now, right or wrong. We should be better than that. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department: Please take a number} 19:10, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

There seemed to be some confusion early on to the number of dead. Some one on site mentioned the number missing and somehow that became the number dead. A lot of the old stories are still floating around on the web.Jeremykshort (talk) 14:11, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

That's what I said. Kafziel ^{Complaint Department: Please take a number} 13:41, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Oh, Good Lord

Now the conspiracy theorists are saying that the fertilizer plant was blown up by a missile: [6] RNealK (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 01:39, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

• I was literally about to say that. I just watched a few videos of it on YouTube and was going to suggest mentioning that people are conspiring about it, but I saw some people saying it was the water that could have caused the explosion, because I guess when you put water on fertilizer it creates some sort of gas, so that could be why it exploded. --Matt723star (talk) 20:51, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
• It MUST be a missile. Given the infinite number of ways that "they" could cause explosions, including many secret technologies that you don't know about, a missile is by far the most covert and simple method of blowing something up. They tried using planes before but people noticed.[/sarcasm]Jade Phoenix Pence (talk) 21:50, 6 November 2013 (UTC)Jade Phoenix Pence

"1.2 kilotonne" explosion

A contributor has repeatedly added a claim [7] regarding a "1.2 kilotonne" explosive yield, sourced to Scientific American. [8] Note that the source is a guest blog, by a person who states that "I am not an expert in the field of explosives and these are back-of-the-envelop estimations on my part". He also makes entirely clear that the 1.2 kilotonne figure is only one possibility. Regarding this figure, he states "Keep in mind this is the size of the explosion only if all the ammonia were to go off. It’s more likely that much of that 54,000 pounds remained unexploded in tanks, exacerbated another explosion, or escaped into the air." Note also that his 'mushroom cloud' estimate suggests "a nearly one-kiloton blast", while his estimate based on ammonium nitrate gives "an explosive yield about 10 times less, or about 100 tons of TNT". It is simply a misrepresentation of the source to quote only the 1.2 kilotonne figure. The blog contributor makes no definitive claims, and neither should Wikipedia. I have asked the contributor to revert and discuss this matter here - I see no reason whatsoever why this misrepresentation of a source should be allowed to stand. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:26, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

I concur. Even full attribution of the tonnage quote, to a guest writer at a Scientific American blog doesn't resolve the fundamental calculation error. We already know the whole supply didn't go up at once, so the calculation can't be right. When in doubt, leave it out.

I also concur with the removal of the sat image and estimate, as totally WP:OR: the description on Commons explains the OR estimate. --Lexein (talk) 23:29, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

Seismograph reading

"Seismograph reading from Hockley, Texas, 142 miles (228 km) south-east of West, clearly displaying the temblor caused by the explosion." is the caption for File:West, Texas Explosion Seismograph from Hockley.gif. I'm looking at this graph, and not clearly getting anything. According to the article, the explosion took place at 7:50 PM (CDT)/6:50 PM (CST). Tracing the 19:00 line across to 50 minutes, I see ... nothing. The 20:00 line at roughly 59 minutes apparently starts swinging wildly through 21:00 at 20 minutes, but that's not when the explosion happened. I get the feeling I'm having a graph pushed at me and told that it clearly says something that it doesn't say.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:33, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

Well, you do have to take into account that this seismograph reading was taken from a facility located approximately 142 miles from the WFC plant. The ground ripples in the same way water does - when an earthquake or other large event (in this case the explosion) occurs, it causes the ground to vibrate and ripple outward from the epicenter. The greater the event, the more disruption it will cause, thus the further away the effects could be observed. This does not happen instantly in the case of such a large event. Being that the seismograph was 142 miles away in Hockley, it would have taken some amount of time for the "ripples" to reach that point. I'm not an expert in seismology, so I don't know exactly how long it would have taken for the disturbance to reach Hockley from West, but I would assume that the time table expressed in the graph is within reason. Jade Phoenix Pence (talk) 12:58, 20 December 2013 (UTC)Jade Phoenix Pence

More graph problems.

The problem with the graph is its lack of explanation. It says it's "clearly displaying" something but not for anyone completely unfamiliar with this stuff. The caption should explain it better. MagnoliaSouth ^(talk) 06:32, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Inadequate Hazmat Placards posted around Plant's Premise

There are several news articles on the web concerning the plant having inadequate hazmat placards posted around the plant's property and buildings. --roger (talk) 00:37, 15 April 2014 (UTC)