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A fact from Van Sickle Island appeared on Wikipedia's
Main Page in the Did you know column on 28 March 2021 (
check views). The text of the entry was as follows:
Did you know... that a
syzygy of celestial bodies caused Van Sickle Island to flood in 2017?
The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as
this nomination's talk page,
the article's talk page or
Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.
ALT1:... that ...? Source: "You are strongly encouraged to quote the source text supporting each hook" (and [link] the source, or cite it briefly without using citation templates)
Comment: The image is very cool, but it's not specifically of the island being flooded in 2017 (couldn't find any photos of that). In case that seems sketchy, there is another image,
File:USGS Aerial imagery of Van Sickle Island, California.png, that can be used instead.
New enough and large enough expansion. QPQ present. The sources in the hook fact don't use the word "syzygy", but one mentions this exact event. I'm OK with the image (which is PD) since no alternative is available and the caption does note it is not the 2017 event. No other textual issues I see.
Sammi Brie (she/her •
t •
c)
18:24, 6 March 2021 (UTC)reply
@
JPxG and
Sammi Brie: came to promote but not confident enough that this is a syzygy without a source that uses the term. Mercury News says Moran explained to visitors that the sun and the moon were both at their closest points to Earth and were also in line. Perhaps it's my astronomical knowledge or reading comprehension, but isn't this just a statement of the Sun and Moon being aligned? From what does it follow that the Earth is also aligned (the "closest points to Earth")? And is this sufficiently trivial an inference to not violate
WP:SYNTH? —
Bilorv (talk)
03:00, 23 March 2021 (UTC)reply
@
Bilorv: It was a spring tide, which is a phenomenon caused by alignment of the sun, earth and moon(referred to as syzygy by a lot of sources); I've added NOAA cites to support that this, as well as there having been a spring tide at the time. jp×g04:26, 23 March 2021 (UTC)reply
Bilorv, the sun and the moon are always in line, just like the sun and the earth are; you can always draw a straight line between two points. It's adding the third celestial body (i.e. in this case, earth) that it becomes a syzygy, because there are now three points in a line. And that creates a much higher gravitational pull that either the sun or the moon on its own would.
MeegsC (
talk)
10:17, 23 March 2021 (UTC)reply
I'm not an experienced reviewer of articles, so my only rating criteria is that the article tells me what I want to know about the subject -- and not too much about what I don't want to know. I believe the summary paragraph needs more information. I immediately wanted to know two things not found in the summary (and a bit difficult to find in the text): who owns the island and how do you get onto it? Ferry, bridge? (I don't see a bridge on the map.) I think those facts should be made more explicit in the text of the summary paragraph or paragraphs.
I was also curious about why governments are investing sizeable sums in maintaining the levees, as mentioned in the budget statistics. Does the island have importance for wildlife conservation -- or is this just a subsidy to influential landowners? Any controversy on that? The rationale for the government investment in the island might be made more explicit.
I dislike red links, but that may not be relevant in reviewing the article. In any case, this is an interesting article about a subject unfamiliar to me that I enjoyed learning about.
Smallchief (
talk)
09:21, 19 March 2021 (UTC)reply
@
Smallchief: I'll attempt to address what you've said:
As for the ownership, the last paragraph in §Geography and ecology is the most comprehensive information I could find (that it's divided into 22 privately owned parcels used for duck hunting clubs and residences; I'll include that information in the lead.
As for access, it is hard to find information, but I've done my best, and you can see the result in what's now the third paragraph in §Geography and ecology.
As for why the government spends a lot of money on keeping it above water, sources don't really give a clear answer. A lot of islands in the Delta are maintained for water quality reasons (i.e. preventing saltwater intrusion), but Suisun bay I am not sure about. There are some conservation efforts (Grizzly Island Wildlife Area is directly to the north); it'd certainly be nice if the articles about
Suisun Bay,
Grizzly Bay and
Honker Bay had more info on this, but it looks like slim pickins since the last of those is a redlink. Anyway, I've added some information about that in the first paragraph of §Geography and ecology.