(meteorobs) Puppid-Velid

Bruce McCurdy bmccurdy at telusplanet.net
Sun Dec 11 03:46:12 EST 2005


Hi again, Pierre. What is the longitude of your observing site? (in other 
words, the time correction) I suppose I'm just interested to know whether 
the radiant was above or below your local horizon at the time. I also 
suppose that it's a moot point, that the meteor itself occurred many tens of 
km above your head so you are looking at the event from an oblique angle. 
With the exception of point meteors, this is always the case, but 
particularly so for an earthgrazer.  I recall when having a discussion about 
the Martian meteor earlier this year, both on this list and AmAstro as I 
recall, the surprising (to me!) conclusion was that it emanated from below 
the horizon, and it seems very possible that your Puppid-Velid might have 
done the same.

Bruce




> Thanks for commenting!  At the 3:20am (local time) sighting, the  radiant 
> was just about at its highest point for me.  In Bob  Lunsford's weekly 
> meteor outlook, he says...
>
>
> "These meteors are best seen near 0300 local standard time when the 
> radiant lies highest above the horizon in a dark sky."
>
>
> Clear skies,
>
> - Pierre
>
>
>
>
> On 10-Dec-05, at 10:54 PM, bmccurdy at telusplanet.net wrote:
>
>>    Sorry for the aborted (non) reply. Pierre Martin wrote:
>>
>>> The highlight was without doubt my first-ever Puppid-Velid !!  And
>>> what a meteor it was!!!  With this radiant at -45 degrees in
>>> declination, it reaches, at best, less than one degree above the
>>> horizon as it crosses the meridien.  So, it was quite a surprise for
>>> me to see one of these rare meteors come up!  At 3:20am EST , it
>>> appeared in the form of a spectacular earthgrazer that slowly crawled
>>> its way up and along the south-west horizon, from southern Canis
>>> Major all the way to the bright star Rigel in Orion.  The flight
>>> lasted a good 6 seconds, which seemed like an eternity, and it
>>> allowed me to turn my head and have a good look at it.  It was pure
>>> white in appearance, and had a sharp wake following behind.  The
>>> meteor gradually swelled up to mag -3, and its "head" looked like a
>>> disk before gracefully vanishing away.  This was one of the most
>>> beautiful meteors that I've seen this year!
>>
>>    Thanks for the great report, Pierre, and congrats on such a rare 
>> catch!
>>
>>    You say that "at best" the Puppid-Velid radiant gets a degree  above 
>> your
>> horizon. How close was the radiant to your local meridian at 3:20  a.m. 
>> on Dec.
>> 8? Have you calculated the radiant's actual location at the time of  your 
>> obs?
>>
>>    Bruce
>>
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