Wikipedia:Peer review/1985 Mexico City earthquake/archive1

1985 Mexico City earthquake

• A script has been used to generate a semi-automated review of the article for issues relating to grammar and house style; it can be found on the automated peer review page for October 2008.

 Doing... Some comments and suggestions for the article. This article is large so I will post comments here as I review. It might take a few days to get through the entire article, so please bear with me.

• General comments:
  • This article contains a lot of technical facts that may be difficult to understand for some readers. It is important, therefore, to describe the events using terminology that the average reader can understand. That typically means using technical terms and then immediately following them with a simpler description in plain English.
  • Make sure you have a verifiable source for each statement and properly use inline citations.
  • The first paragraph is very important. It provides a summary of the entire article and is a form of teaser to attract the reader to read the whole article. This paragraph should be factual, easy to read, and most importantly, easy for teh reader to understand.
  • Avoid drawing conclusions. Just state the facts and let the reader draw their own conclusions. Some examples to avoid//change:
    • First sentence is unsupported by refs and contains peacock terms. Just state the facts, viz: "The 1985 Mexico City earthquake was a magnitude 8.1 earthquake that struck Mexico City, Mexico on Thursday, 19 September 1985."
  • Do not wikilink any dates (see WP:MOSNUM) and maintain consistent date formats throughout the article. Make sure you do not mix 19 September 1985 and September 19 1985.
  • Avoid the word "but" and unsupported comparisons, and simplify whenever possible. For example, in the first paragraph, suggest changing "The locations of the quakes were off the Mexican Pacific coast, more than 350 km away, but due to strength of the quake and the fact that Mexico City sits on an old lakebed, the distance was no protection. The event caused between three and four billion USD in damage as 412 buildings collapsed and another 3,124 were seriously damaged in the city. While the number is in dispute, the most-often cited number of deaths is about 10,000 people." to "Although centered more than 350 km away off the Mexican Pacific coast, the strong quakes killed about 10,000 people(ref) and caused between three and four billion USD in damage as 412 buildings collapsed and another 3,124 were seriously damaged in Mexico City, which sits on an old lakebed."
  • Use consistent verb tense throughout. For example, "The 19 September quake was a multiple event with two epicenters and the second movement occurring 26 seconds after the first." mixes tense. It would be better if "occurring" were changed to "occurred".
  • Good usage of pictures to illustrate the article. Please make sure they follow Wikipedia guidelines and policy for what can and cannot be used as pictures, and that they are properly licensed for use.
• Specific comments
  • The Legacy section seems somewhat disjointed. This type of section should describe the long-lasting effects of the quake. The first sentence doesn't do that and belongs somewhere else in the article, if it's needed at all. The second sentence might be better started as "Because of the earthquake, a new alert system, Sistema de Alerta Sísmica ... was created." This pair of sentences "An alarm is supposed to go off in Mexico City (similar to an air-raid siren) when an earthquake of 6.0 or higher is detected. However, it does not always work." is overly negative compared to the cited ref (My Spanish is average). Better might be "The system should sound an alarm when an earthquake of 6.0 or higher is detected; sometimes it has failed to sound the alarm." The rest of this section is good.
  • In the Torre Mayor section, the first sentence ends with a comma. There should be a period (full stop) after "damage occurred".
• to be continued ...

Truthanado (talk) 03:32, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because… I did a heck of a lot of work on it! About as complete as its gonna get. Thanks, Thelmadatter (talk) 17:07, 11 October 2008 (UTC)