(meteorobs) Meteor Obs. 12/30/08 - Mathias, WVa

[George Gliba]

      Screech Owl Hill Observatory, Mountain Meadows
         Mathias, West Virginia 385710N 0785544W
                   December 29/30, 2008

   We had a very windy night two nights ago in Mathias,
West Virginia, but the transparency was very good. We
had some wind gusts to 60 mph, and one gust blew our
8-inch Celestron down, breaking part of it, and putting
it out of service for the night. Luckly, we got to see
comet C/2006 W3 Christensen just before the accident.

   I was able to get in two hours of meteor observing
from 8 to 10 UT. Activity from the Coma Berenicids was
good, with 8 members being see. Also seen were 5 Anti-
helions, 1 Northern Apex meteor, 3 Southern Apex meteors,
and 30 sporadics. The best meteors were only of the 1st
magnitude, but one 0 magnitude yellow meteor was seen at
the western corner of my eye, but I didn't count it as I
couldn't tell what direction it was going. At the end of
the night I spotted comet C/2007 N3 Lulin close to beta
Scorpii before dawn.


  Time (UT) LM %Obst.ANT COM NPX SPX SPO Total   FOV
08:00-09:00 6.5  0%   3   4   1   1   16   25  09.7+12
09:00-10:00 6.4  0%   2   4   0   2   14   22  11.0+12


Magnitude Distributions (08:00-10:00 UT - LM=6.45)

     0   1   2   3   4   5  total Ave.
ANT  0   0   0   3   1   1    5   3.6
COM  0   2   3   1   2   0    8   2.4
NPX  0   0   1   0   0   0    1   2.0
SPX  0   0   2   1   0   0    3   2.3
SPO  0   4   3  15   4   4   30   3.0

Clear Skies,
GWG