(meteorobs) Fw: Disintegrating meteor photos

[GeoZay at aol.com]

Wes>>   If it is a meteor, it is a slow one and  approaching the camera
almost head on as shown by the short, bright head  streak.  It is also a
large meteor coming in at a grazing incidence, as  shown by the horizon in
the FOV.   Given that, the  trail  would be almost 4 or 5 seconds duration
and shows the effects of  disintegration into multiple spinning pieces fore
shortened by the telescopic  effect and head on view.  A 2 second exposure
shows a lot more trail  than one normally sees in video images and the short
arc of the head exposure  tells us that the radiant is likely in the FOV.<<
 
If you believe this is a meteor almost head on, then I would have to  
disagree that it is even a meteor. From my experience of  observing/photographing 
meteors entering near the radiant, they are not  streaks...they have what I refer 
to as a "feather" look. That is  the leading edge looks somewhat pointed, 
while the rear end has a spread  out look to it. This is caused by the spreading 
out of the train as the meteor  passes. I do not see this with this image at 
all. If a meteor, it appears  short, but I think that is because the shutter 
cut off at least one  side. The Field of View is small and if any of the meteor 
is cut off like  I'm assuming, the path length is too long to have the radiant 
in the  Field. Again assuming to be a meteor, I think the meteor would be 
about as  long as the assumed train is in the photograph, if it wasn't cut off by 
the  opening of the shutter. If it was as short as Wes believes, I think we  
should be seeing a lot of train on both sides of what remains of the meteor  
image...but we don't, its almost all on the right. And there's no hint  of the 
initial bright tube of the ionized train showing up against the  background of 
supposedly dimmer distorted train. Somehow the  distorted dim train got 
picked up photographically while omitting the  brighter central tube? I still say 
this is not a meteor train. Robs idea  that it is a shaking star image holds 
more water to me than a meteor train. And  Ed's revealing that the camera used 
doesn't have a shutter lock up, means  that the photographer would have had to 
done the equivalent of  the "Mexican Hat Trick" to avoid any shaking stars. 
That is hold  something in front of the telescope for several seconds after 
squeezing off  the cable release and when the vibrations stop, remove the object 
and start  the exposure. 
George Zay