User:WeatherWriter/Damage RFC

NOTE: This is just the draft of the wording & background for an RFC. This is not the actual RFC. When this becomes an actual RFC, all editors of WikiProject Weather will be notified.

How should weather disaster articles (such as tornadoes, tropical cyclones, floods, winter storms, ect...) deal with damage estimates for the infobox? (Five-Related Questions; See Background Below)

Background

Article text can easily be written to specify various sources and the various damage estimates from natural disasters. However, the infobox can only contain a single parameter. This single parameter topic has been the subject of numerous discussions, old and recent, all of which have led to confusion and mixed consensuses over the years. Below is a list of those previous discussions so editors can be familiar with them.

Several on Talk:List of costliest Atlantic hurricanes, Discussions 2009–2022
August–September 2022 – Discussion on whether NOAA damage estimates vs Aon (company) damage estimates should be used. Discussion voided due to WP:SOCKS. Aon is consensus-considered a reliable source.
RFC March–May 2023 – "Consensus that calculating tornado costliness based off of NOAA, generally due to issues with NOAA itself, does not fall under WP:CALC but more so WP:OR"..."Most editors seem to think that due to data issues with NOAA itself, that calculating ranks of tornado damage within a year without a non-NOAA source would violate WP:OR. Editors should reference a non-NOAA secondary source when claiming a tornado as the Xth-costliest". WP:VNTIA created following this RFC conclusion.
RSN September–October 2024 – Reliable Source Noticeboard discussion on AccuWeather damage estimates. "Unreliable" thrown around & infobox damage ranges through around amid the discussion. No formal closing/decision.
January 2025–Present – NOAA vs unofficial damage estimates discussion. Editors requesting larger discussion to solve issue.
RFC February–March 2025 – Consensus fell to use a damage estimate range for the infobox. Example seen in the infobox of this version of the 2023 Rolling Fork–Silver City tornado.
March 2025–Present – Post-Feb-Mar 2025 RFC discussion, which kickstarted this RFC.

This generic question for the discussion is ultimately several smaller questions that need answered in order to create a policy/pattern that can be used across a wide variety of articles, from Stubs to Featured Articles, to tornadoes and hurricanes. Below are the various questions that have been discussed/questioned multiple times on multiple articles:

If a countries government (such as NOAA for the United States or CMA for China or ECCC for Canada) provides an "official" damage estimate for a natural disaster, should that damage estimate be used in the infobox, even if other reliable sources may or may not have different damage estimates.
Should the infobox contain a damage estimation range, reflected based on the article's text and subsequent sources, regardless of governmental "official" damage estimations?
What if the affected countries government has not given a damage estimation? How should that be reflected in the infobox?
What if the source is classified on WP:RSP as "no consensus" or "unreliable"?
What if new research is conducted, which makes previous sources "outdated", with either overestimations or underestimations?

All five of those questions are the root of this infobox damage dilemma, which has occurred on Wikipedia for years. Below is some additional background/examples for each of those five questions:

Example is Hurricane Helene. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a branch of the United States government, published a 107-page report on Helene, in which they state "Helene caused an estimated $78.7 billion in damage in the United States". Other sources published a lot of damage estimates, either before or after this report by NOAA, which is why Hurricane Helene#United_States_2 has an opening paragraph explaining the different damage estimates, such as those from Moody's Analytics (half of what NOAA estimated) and AccuWeather (triple what NOAA estimated).
Example of the range is seen on the 2023 Rolling Fork–Silver City tornado. NOAA ("Official") stated the damage was $96,644,200 (fairly specific), while the Mississippi Insurance Department via the news outlet PBS (not their own website/reports) stated "near" $100 million. Two different numbers from two different reliable sources; official vs unofficial.
An example of this is the 2021 Western Kentucky tornado, where NOAA never released an official damage estimate for the tornado. As of this moment, the infobox has no damage estimate, despite various news outlets publishing town/building-specific damage estimates (such as this one for downtown Mayfield, Kentucky). Should the infobox be blank or contain information released unofficially?
Only two weather sources have questionable reliability following discussion at the Reliable Source Noticeboard: AccuWeather (here; no formal RFC, so still classified as being generally reliable...several editors have expressed the opposite of this in various discussions not on RSN) & Tornado Talk (here; RFC classified as "generally unreliable".) As seen in this discussion, how should damage estimates from these sources be handled? Should they be ignored for the infobox?
Example is Hurricane Milton. Initial & detailed analysis from Fitch Ratings put damage estimates at $50 billion for the hurricane. A few months later, NOAA published a damage estimate of $34.3 billion. Currently, the infobox in the article only reflects NOAA's estimate, as it was the later-published damage estimate. Both damage estimates are stated & sourced in the article text, but only NOAA, the later-published/"official" one, is used in the infobox. Should the infobox reflect the latest-published damage estimate, even if it is unofficial (picturing a reversal of that, where an organization like Fitch Rating published after NOAA).

In the discussion below, please provide some insight towards these five unique-but-interconnected questions, so Wikipedia can solve this highly-debated and discussed issue.

Discussion

(Left empty as it will be used in RFC)