(meteorobs) Observation January 3/4 2008 & c.

[Bruce McCurdy]

    Thanks, Pierre, for the wonderful reports. You really have had an 
eventful year. For all the great counts you have had under enviably dark 
skies, the traffic light fireball takes the cake!

    I had trouble opening the link for the Quadrantids picture, but after a 
little copying and pasting was able to access it. I created the following 
TinyURL which will work more easily for list members:
http://tinyurl.com/55u5m3

    Nice pic! Almost as nice as that terrific Orionids image of yours that 
got published in the Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada 
earlier this year. Congratulations for that, btw. ;-)

    Bruce
    *****

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Pierre Martin" <dob14.5 at sympatico.ca>
To: <meteorobs at meteorobs.org>
Sent: Sunday, August 10, 2008 7:03 PM
Subject: (meteorobs) Observation January 3/4 2008


>
> Hello all,
>
> I don't think I've ever been so far behind with my observing reports,
> but better late than never!  ;0)  Going back to January's Quadrantid
> shower, I realized that I sent the data to the IMO, but not on
> meteorobs.  For what it's worth, here it is...
>
> For this shower, the weather did not cooperate - yet I was eager to
> try and catch the Quads, which were predicted to be ideally
> positioned for a peak above the east coast of NA!  I decided to
> travel several hours south to join Wayne Hally who was setup for the
> night at the NJAA Observatory (in High Bridge, New Jersey).  Skies
> there were forecasted to be at least semi-clear... but that was a lot
> better than the solid cloudiness above Ottawa.  A friend from Ottawa,
> Todd Weeks, joined me for the trip.  We shared the driving.
>
> We had cloudy periods for most of the night, but the final hour was
> completely clear!  This timing was ideal thanks to the well-
> positioned radiant high up in the sky.  With a sky limit mag 5.7, it
> was obvious that the Quads were somewhere near full tilt, with 53
> seen in just 1 hour!  The most impressive event was a long mag 0
> sporadic earthgrazer at 5:20am EST, in Leo, followed just a few
> seconds later by a bright mag -1 Quad, also in Leo.  Both of these
> meteors were caught by my DSRL, as well as two other fainter Quads...
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/13845235@N03/2742298295/sizes/o/in/
> set-72157606599759816/
>
> After all these years, it was a treat to not only catch the Quads
> near maximum, but also to share this night with Wayne and Todd.
>
> Pierre Martin
> Ottawa, Ontario
>
>
>
> DATE: January 3/4 2008
> BEGIN: 0645 UT (0145 EST) END: 1113 UT (0613 EST)
> OBSERVER: Pierre Martin (MARPI)
> LOCATION: Long: -74 53' 54" West; Lat: 40 40' 52" North
> City & Province: High Bridge, New Jersey, USA
> RECORDING METHOD: talking clock, tape recorder, cord align
> ----------------------------------------------------------
>
> OBSERVED SHOWERS:______________________________radiant position
> ANT (antihelions)______________________________07:52 (118) +20
> AHY (Alpha Hydrids - non-IMO shower)___________08:32 (128) -13
> ELE (Epsilon Leonids - non-IMO shower)_________09:44 (146) +25
> COM (Coma Berenicids)__________________________12:40 (190) +18
> QUA (Quadrantids)______________________________15:20 (230) +49
> SPO (sporadics)
> ----------------------------------------------------------
>
> OBSERVING PERIODS: 0 = none seen; / = shower not observed
>
> PERIOD(UT)___FIELD____Teff____F______LM____QUA__SPO__ANT__COM__AHY__ELE
>
> 0645-0720___0944+10___0.58___1.18___5.85____7____2____0____0____0____0
> 1006-1113___1259+14___1.05___1.00___5.72___53____7____0____0____0____0
>
> TOTALS:_______________1.63_________________60____9____0____0____0____0
> = 69
>
> Note: The first column (Period UT) refers to observing periods broken
> down as close as possible to one hour of true observing, in Universal
> Time. The second column (Field) is the area in in the sky where I
> centered my field of view. The third column (TEFF) represents
> effective observing time (corrected for breaks or any time not spent
> looking at the sky). The column (LM) is the average naked eye
> limiting magnitude, determined by triangle star counts. All following
> columns indicate the number of meteors for each shower observed.
> ------------------------
>
> MAGNITUDE DISTRIBUTIONS:
>
> SHOWER
> ______-2__-1___0__+1__+2__+3__+4__+5______AVE
>
> QUA____1___2___4__12__10__15__10___6_____+2.40
> SPO____1___0___2___2___0___2___2___0_____+1.55
>
> Note: Magnitude -8 is comparable to a quarter moon, magnitude -4 with
> the planet Venus, magnitude -1 with the brightest star Sirius,
> magnitude +2 to +3 with most average naked eye stars and magnitude +6
> to +7 are the faintest stars the naked eye can see under typical dark
> conditions. A meteor of at least magnitude -3 is considered a
> fireball. The above table contains the magnitudes from all observed
> meteors, and the average (last column) for showers.
> ------------------------
>
> SKY OBSCURED (FOV) (UT):  none
>
> ------------------------
>
> Dead time: 4 min (breaks)
>
> Breaks (UT): 7:20-10:06, 10:18-20, 11:02-04
>
>
>
>
>
>
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