Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Finnair flight AY 915

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. Spartaz ^Humbug! 05:44, 2 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Finnair flight AY 915

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Not newspaper, GNG, Sources not verifiable, no outcome, no damage, no casualties, Possible hoax due to lack of verifiable souces, the list goes on.... Petebutt (talk) 13:25, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Aviation-related deletion discussions. Jinkinson talk to me 14:34, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Finland-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:51, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Events-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:51, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Transportation-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:51, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete The incident can be notable but what did or did not happen isn't verifiable. It is the claims of two people over 25+ years later in a tabloid newspaper. There is no other source to back it up, so delete....William 18:06, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

~~On Hold~~ The article is very recent, it is only normal that there is room for improvement, especially as regards sources. I regret that it was nominated for deletion so soon, seeing the effort that was put into it. My vote would be to wait for at least a couple of weeks before taking any action; meanwhile checking for the incident to appear on the well-known aviation incident sites. Jan olieslagers (talk) 18:42, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Need I say more? I hope lessons will be learned by some early delete voters. Jan olieslagers (talk) 10:51, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

*Wait per Jan olieslagers. Mjroots (talk) 18:52, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep per Apanuggpak and Finnusertop. The article has been expanded and appears to meet GNG. That the majority of sources are in Finnish does not make them unreliable or unverifiable. Google Translate can do a reasonable job on most major languages nowadays, at least allowing the gist of a source to be gleaned. Mjroots (talk) 21:10, 24 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Delete was not notable enough to report in 1987 so 2014 speculation about the supposed event does not make it notable now. MilborneOne (talk) 19:05, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

~~Delete~~ Keep - ~~Relying on a single, unverifiable source, it sounds quite apocryphal. Extraordinary claims require more than this.~~ Since the article has now been expanded and includes many reliable refs it meets WP:GNG and should be kept. - Ahunt (talk) 19:44, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. There's really nothing here. This is a single newspaper credulously reporting the statement of two co-pilots, 25 years after the purported incident, in the absence of any official record of the incident. The flight captain made no report at the time; conveniently, this "revelation" comes out after he has passed away and the 1987 logbooks have wandered off into whatever part of history all lost documents go. Even taking the article claims at face value (which I am loathe to, to say the least), this event had no actual impact: no effect on the plane, no effect on the flight at all, no political impact. In the unlikely event that this becomes a wider political topic later, we can revisit it then. Now, however, this simply does not meet either the subject matter inclusion guidelines for airliner incidents nor the notability guidelines in general. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 20:25, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. The alleged incident wouldn't necessarily have to be true to be notable; it could also become a notable unverified claim if it were to get traction and coverage in a variety of reliable sources. So far, however, all I could find was a Yle report summarizing the claims from the initial Helsingin Sanomat article. [1] These are both reliable sources but by themselves this isn't enough. We'd want to see, at least, some independent reporting on the co-pilots' allegations. --Arxiloxos (talk) 20:33, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - 25 years on and still no evidence of notability... –Davey2010 • (talk) 20:38, 22 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep, if I may say so as the author of this article.

Notability: Practically every newspaper and every electronic media has covered this matter on the same day it was published by Helsingin Sanomat. The coverage continued for some more days. Finnish politicians (former cabinet members) are outraged, former head of the Finnish Security Intelligence Service has also expressed having been dismayed by the news.

The article now has 19 different media citations of this news in Finland (from a dozen different media, most of them known to even en-Wiki), all of which can be found on-line. I would call that notability. Use Google translate in case you have doubts.

As stated in an additional paragraph in introduction, this incident is part of a string of very significant incidents:

Reliability: Not a single voice in Finland has been heard stating that the claims of the pilots would be false or invented. Even if reported back in 1987, there still would have been the word of the pilots against anyone who doubted the truth of their report.

Defense experts in Finland, our top missile expert from the National Defence University of Finland (Professor Stefan Forss) as well as the former second-in-command (Colonel Ahti Lappi) of the anti-aircraft branch of the Finnish military have commented on the matter, expressing do doubts as to the truth of the alleged incident.

Thus, the article now has independent assessment of the pilot’s story.

Not reported: If reported and leaked to the press, the leakers would have faced, according to the penal code of Finland at the time, a maximum jail sentence of two years for harming the relations of Finland and a foreign country, for all practical purposes, the Soviet Union. This clause was added to the legislation of Finland in 1948. — Finnish Wikipedia on Finlandization:

“Itsesensuurilla oli myös juridinen perusteensa: vuonna 1948 rikoslakiin lisättiin kappale, jonka mukaan Suomen ja vieraan valtion, käytännössä lähinnä Neuvostoliiton, suhteita vahingoittavasta materiaalista voitiin tuomita enimmillään kahdeksi vuodeksi vankeuteen. Rikokseksi määriteltiin vieraan valtion julkinen ja tahallinen halventaminen "painotuotteella, kirjoituksella, kuvallisella esityksellä tahi muulla ilmaisuvälineellä". Virallinen syyttäjä sai nostaa syytteen kyseisessä lainkohdassa määritellystä rikoksesta vain tasavallan presidentin määräyksestä ja ensimmäisenä oikeusasteena tällaisten tapausten käsittelyssä oli hovioikeus. — Kemppinen, Kullervo: Lakitiedon Pikkujättiläinen, s. 653. Porvoo: WSOY, 1985.

— ‘Selfcensorship also had a legal basis: in 1948 a paragraph was added to the Finnish penal code, according to which producing materials that harm the relations of Finland and a foreign country, in practice mainly the Soviet Union, a person could be sentenced to jail for a maximum of two years. The public and deliberate defaming of a foreign country would be punishable if it had been done by “printed matters, a writing, a picture or any other means of expression.” A public prosecutor was allowed to press charges only on the orders of the president of the country, and the first instance for the trial would have been the court of appeals.’ — Kemppinen, Kullervo: Lakitiedon Pikkujättiläinen (‘The Little Giant of Legal Knowledge’), p. 653. Porvoo: WSOY, 1985.

— In 1987 this was still a very real threat in Finland.

Tabloid newspaper: This simply is not true, in the negative sense of this expression (i.e. yellow press). Helsingin Sanomat is the biggest newspaper in all of Scandinavia, and the most authoritative print media in Finland. It is true that its physical appearance today is a tabloid format (due to the necessity of have the same format in print and on-line), but until a couple of years ago it was printed in broadsheet format. It is generally not bought at newsstands, but it is ordered and delivered to homes all across the country. It is definitely not a scandal-seeking media.

Please read the updated version of the article, and reconsider (those who are in favour of deletion.) Apanuggpak (talk) 19:07, 23 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep: I can confirm the claims made by Apanuggpak in the comment above, particularly in relation to the reliable and verifiable nature of the Finnish language sources. Recognizing that there is a reason why there has not been any sources since 1987 until very recently, it's WP:NOTNEWS either since the coverage has been in-depth and varied. Furthermore, it's not our job to assess if the pilots are telling the truth - this assessment has already been done by the sources and given their reliability and consistency there is no reason to doubt them. As for the tricky question of (political) impact (WP:EFFECT) raised by Squeamish Ossifrage, this is an important question and it might be too early to say. However, the article does meet WP:GNG and thus conforms with WP:EVENT: "Events are probably notable if they have enduring historical significance and meet the general notability guideline, or if they have a significant lasting effect". There is historical significance as the authorities' response was characterized by the atmosphere of Finlandization, and this aspect is covered in the article. Finnusertop (talk | guestbook | contribs) 02:43, 24 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Still not notable with no verifiable sources--Petebutt (talk) 14:57, 24 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

@Petebutt: - sources are verifiable, whether or not you understand Finnish. Mjroots (talk) 22:02, 24 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Can you specify what makes the sources unverifiable? For instance, them being in Finnish does not make them unverifiable (see WP:SOURCEACCESS) or unreliable. Finnusertop (talk | guestbook | contribs) 20:46, 24 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep: I agree with Apanuggpak on all claims. Is the consensus here really that the biggest newspaper in Finland is yellow press, and that Finnish Government officials are unreliable? I have to point out that aviation incidents can sometimes be notable even without deaths or other permanent damage. Especially those from the Cold War era. I also agree with Arxiloxos. Ceosad (talk) 21:25, 24 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Obvious keep: Hell, it was on all the radio news shows here in Canada, and the Toronto Star. Enough, snow this one already. Maury Markowitz (talk) 01:23, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: Veritable sources, mostly in Finnish, understood by at least 5 milj. people. --Abc10 (talk) 05:09, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - I respect the early request for deletion, as vigilance is required to keep WP clear of dross, but it may have been a bit premature given the sources now in the article. It is now an obvious WP:SNOWBALL, and should be speedily kept. Regards, Peacemaker67 (send... over) 10:38, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment not sure a speedy close is appropriate to an article with lots of issues, filling most of the article with mentions in the Finnish press still doesnt make it notable, with much speculation and assumption made years later it is clearly tabloid fodder but wikipedia is WP:NOTNEWS. MilborneOne (talk) 11:46, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: 'But [GNG] guideline does not specify the locality of the coverage. Having sources that under all circumstances meet this guideline means that it is notable, and therefore, worthy of an article.' See this:WP:FARAWAY. Ceosad (talk) 14:42, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: I read Faraway, that took me to Notability re geographic scope and I ended up WP:Diverse which says "...sources that simply mirror or tend to follow other sources, or are under common control with other sources, are usually discounted" Is the Finnish language reporting diverse? GraemeLeggett (talk) 17:45, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: As far as I know, the most important sources are reasonably independent. A few of the sources could, and should, be removed and consolidated because they are pretty much identical, and not independent from the Helsingin Sanomat and STT. (Both are owned by the Sanoma News. STT sells news to many smaller newspapers, who usually don't even edit them.) See references 28. to 34., just for a perfectly typical example of Finnish "copy-and-paste" journalism. They are almost identical clones. Vast majority of the news in Finland can be traced back to the STT. I think that (atleast) Nelonen Media, Yle and Uusi Suomi are most(ly) independent from the Helsingin Sanomat in this case. Ceosad (talk) 21:30, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

In the US, a flurry of articles published at roughly the same time in many or most papers is sometimes the result of legitimate journalism across the board, but is frequently simply the propagation of stories provided by one of the major wire services (especially the Associated Press). I have less than zero familiarity with Finnish media, but I largely assume at least some of this reporting is not independent. There was an offhand mention of coverage of this topic in the Toronto Star; I couldn't find that after a cursory search, but if this was the subject of examination outside of Finland, that would go some ways to overcoming my WP:EVENT-based objections. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 21:46, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.