(meteorobs) Geminid obs, Sharon Massachusetts, 14 Dec 2004

Wendy Ison laxkitty16 at hotmail.com
Tue Dec 14 13:49:16 EST 2004


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Wendy Ison

>From: Richard Kramer <kramer at sria.com>
>Reply-To: Global Meteor Observing Forum <meteorobs at meteorobs.org>
>To: Global Meteor Observing Forum <meteorobs at meteorobs.org>
>Subject: (meteorobs) Geminid obs, Sharon Massachusetts, 14 Dec 2004
>Date: Tue, 14 Dec 2004 12:29:15 -0500
>
>Finally !
>
>After an interminable string of clouds and mirk, a chance to log a few 
>Geminids. The sky was discouraging at 11PM local time with a thick island 
>of stationary cumulus comfortably settled overhead. The horizon showed a 
>band of clear sky in every direction, but my stubborn local cumulus were 
>refusing to budge. Not very hopeful, at 1AM I went out to take a final look 
>at the clouds and was pleasantly surprised to see that they were gone. 
>Unfortunately, they were replaced by a general haze which took a big bite 
>out of the LM.
>
>Fortunately, bright GEMs were plentiful, almost all of them glowing an 
>unearthly, emerald green and most of them leaving brief, luminous trains. A 
>couple of the brightest metoers left trains which lasted about 1 second 
>before they faded into the murky urban light pollution. I'm sure I was only 
>seeing the brightest fraction of what was likely a very active shower.
>
>One highlight of the session was the fastest meteor, by far, that I've ever 
>seen. It was a dim sporadic which had to be travelling more than 100 km/sec 
>!!!  It was moving so fast that a velocity estimate is extremely difficult. 
>It appeared and disappeared so fast that it gave more the impression of an 
>arrow straight lightning flash than a meteor. It spanned some 40 degrees 
>stretching from north to south, almost parallel to, and just west of, the 
>meridian at 07:01 UTC. Dimmer than mag 3, it was the faintest meteor of the 
>evening, but spectacular for its velocity.
>
>Activity seemed to be "clumpy." There were a number of near simultaneous 
>meteors, sometimes diverging from the radiant in different directions, and 
>sometimes seeming to be pairs of particles travelling together and making 
>nearly parallel traces when they hit our atmosphere. Once such pair could 
>have been mistaken for a skipping entry, a bright short trace starting 
>close to the radiant, followed by a longer trace, exactly colinear with the 
>first, beginning farther from the radiant and running considerably longer. 
>These were definitely two separate particles because the second trace began 
>slightly before the first trace was finished. They must have certainly been 
>two very similar particles which had been making their journey around the 
>sun in close formation for all those years.
>
>After breaking camp for the short walk home, I managed to irritate a 
>neighborhood screech owl with my imperfect attempts at a call. He raged 
>back at me from the middle of a nearby wetland as the emerald GEMs 
>continued to streak overhead during my amble home. It was a delightful way 
>to conclude the evening.
>
>Richard
>
>---------
>
>Richard Kramer Sharon MA USA
>71 deg 10.87 min W   42 deg 6.53 min N  Elev 220 ft
>
>2004
>EST 01:33 14 Dec  to 02:33 14 Dec
>UTC 06:33 14 Dec  to 07:33 14 Dec
>
>Showers observed GEM
>
>14 Dec
>UTC              Teff   LM     GEM    SPO    Total
>06:33 - 06:50    .27    4       4      2       6
>06:50 - 07:01    .17    4       6      0       6
>07:01 - 07:13    .20    4       0      2       2
>07:13 - 07:22    .15    4       7      0       7
>07:22 - 07:29    .11    4       5      0       5
>07:29 - 07:33    .07    4       0      0       0
>TOTAL            .97    -      22      4      26
>
>Magnitude Distributions
>
>          -2  -1   0   1   2   3  TOTAL
>GEM       1   1   5   5   5   5    22
>SPO       0   0   0   0   2   2     4
>
>Notes:
>1. Facing south center of field was between Orion and Gemini
>2. Time bins are irregular due to problems with my primary clock, times are 
>accurate
>3. LM shown as 4, but declined to 2, 30 degrees off the zenith because of 
>haze and light pollution. Effectively, obscuration was 10% at LM 2, 35% at 
>LM 3, and 50% at LM 4.
>4. Temp 27F winds south, steady at 10 km/hr.
>
>---
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