(meteorobs) Perseid outburst prediction this year?

[Geert Barentsen]

Hello meteorobs,

First, let me say thank you to Esko, Sergey, Jeremie, Rob and many others 
for the interesting e-mails lately!!  In addition, many thanks to Lew for 
bringing up topics and managing this excellent list!


Here are some additional remarks concerning the Perseids:

* The favourable phase of the moon in 2004 (~15% illumination on august 12) 
seems to be rather unique. Similar chances for enhanced activity caused by 
Jupiter/Saturn perturbations will have to deal with a lot of lunar 
interference. The conditions will be moderate in 2005 (40% illumination) 
and 2012 (30%), but bad in 2008 (80%), 2009 (70%), 2016 (60%) and 2028 
(70%). It may be difficult to gather and analyse visual data in those 
years. It must be a conspiracy :-(

* A question to observers: do you have any special plans to observe the 
Perseids this year? Members of our Belgian group will observe from 
different places in Romania and France!

* August will be a perfect month to "tell the world" about meteor showers! 
If you are involved in some astronomical organisation or (public) 
observatory, why not make a short Perseid press release and send it out to 
the local media? TV/Radio/Newspapers often love to interview experienced 
amateurs or observers about a subject like this, but rarely take the 
initiative to look for one... unless you send them a communication! 
(However, try to avoid terms like "enhanced activity", "extra outburst", 
etc... false hypes are easily started, and can damage meteor science.)

* Let's tell our deepsky- and astrophotography-friends about telescopic and 
photographic meteor observing! Many amateurs often capture meteors during 
the Perseid maximum, but rarely use their equipment to "observe" (= 
retrieve the exact time, coordinates, velocity, etc... of a recorded 
meteor). Accurate plots may learn us more about the Perseid radiant structure!
...did you know that the entire IMO photographic handbook can be downloaded 
for free at http://www.imo.net/photo/ (PDF)?


Please share your opinions! The Perseids will be here in 68 days from now, 
so let's get busy :-)
Many greetings,
Geert




At 20:42 25-5-2004, you wrote:
>The latest issue of WGN (the newsletter of IMO - the
>International Meteor Organization) is out, and among
>other interesting-sounding items in the announcement
>from editor Chris Trayner, I noticed the following:
>
>  Perseid one-revolution outburst in 2004
>    Esko Lyytinen and Tom Van Flandern
>
>  The scatter of orbital semimajor axes from a Perseid stream model
>    Kondrat'eva E.D. and Ishmukhametova M.G.
>
>Esko is among our readers, as are several other well-
>informed pros and amateur meteor scientists. So I was
>impelled to ask - what ARE the latest predictions for
>a Perseid outburst this year?
>
>
>Clear skies all!
>
>Lew Gramer, fresh back from the West Texas desert