An ear cup housing has several reference microphones, an error microphone and a speaker. A processor drives the speaker for acoustic noise cancellation and transparency, by processing the microphone signals, and performs an oversight process by adjusting the reference microphone signals in response to detecting wind noise events and scratch events. In another aspect, the ear cup housing has an outside face that is joined to an inside face by a perimeter and the reference microphones are on the perimeter. Other aspects are also described and claimed.