(meteorobs) Antihelion and Taurid Meteors

[Rainer Arlt]

Dear meteor observers,

Paul Martsching wrote:
> I certainly cannot tell the difference in velocity between Antihelion meteors
> and Taurid meteors.  I think it serves no useful purpose to pretend to be more
> accurate than what the case really is.  I think more errors of identification
> will occur if observers try to differentiate these and the data will be no
> better for it.  


For the new Working List of Meteor Showers, we plan to 
have an anthelion source for most of the year. We will
actually call it "Eclipticids" because the anthelion
name suggests that the anthelion is something special
for the origin of meteoroids. It is not; the vicinity
of the eclipticid radiant to the anthelion is accidental!

Back to the shower list... some periods are special in
that they provide much more distinct activity from the
eclipticids including known bodies which may be parent
for that distinct activity. These periods would be
the Capricornids and the Taurids. During that period,
it may be best to exclude the Eclipticids from the
shower list to avoid confusion and to account for the
difficulties in distinguishing them.

I think these ideas will feature in the 2007 Shower
Calendar. The radiant ephemeris will be based on the
results of video monitoring throughout the year.

Best wishes,
Rainer


-- 
Rainer Arlt  --  Astrophysikalisches Institut Potsdam -- www.aip.de
Visual Commission - International Meteor Organization -- www.imo.net
rarlt at aip.de --  phone: +49-331-7499-354  --  fax: +49-331-7499-526