(meteorobs) Aries-Triangulids seen 09/12 & 9/14 - Mathias, WVa

George Gliba gliba at milkyway.gsfc.nasa.gov
Wed Sep 16 16:21:45 EDT 2009


         Screech Owl Hill Observatory, Mountain Meadows
             Mathias, West Virginia 385710N 0785544W
                     Sept. 11/12 to 14/15, 2009

    I wanted to observe near the maximun of the Aries-Triangulids
(A-T) this year, as it has been 5 years since I have seen significant
activity, back on Sept. 12/13, 2004. Instead of looking for only the
usual two sub-radiants, near alpha Tri. and alpha Ari,, and grouping
them together as ATR, I've included a third sub-radiant near beta Tri.
(BTR) this year, to differentiate them. All three of these sub-radiants
can be considered part of the A-T complex of radiants. This time, only
the alpha Tri. radiant got the ATR designation, which is also in-line
with the IMO recognition of ATR as alpha Tri. meteors only. Unfortunetly,
it was cloudy for me on September 12/13 this year, which may nave been
the maximum for the ATR sub-radiant.

    I first noticed the BTR in 1994, and included them in my ATR totals
then, but I unfortunetly didn't specify them seperately. On Sept. 11/12,
1998, the Japanese meteor observer, Osada Kazuhiro was able to plot 9
meteors from this radiant from 14:15 to 16:30 UT, as reported in the Minor
Meteor Shower Circular #57 (MMSC). Interestingly, his average magnitude
was 4.4, while my average from four BTR was 4.5 this year. As can be seen
below, the A-T meteors from all three sub-radiants are generally faint,
and thus diffucult to detect visually. I was able to get five hours of
observing total done on three of the four nights near maximum though. The
2nd clear night had superb transparency.


  Time (UT)     LM  %Obst. STA ATR ARI BTR SET NPX SPX SPO Total 

9/12 4:00-5:00  6.4  15%    4   4   0   0   1   1   0   10  20

9/14 4:00-5:00  6.7   0%    2   3   1   1   0   1   0    9  17
9/14 5:00-6:00  6.7   0%    2   2   0   2   0   0   0   12  18

9/15 4:04-5:04  6.4  20%    2   1   0   0   1   1   0    7  12
9/15 5:04-6:04  6.5   0%    4   0   1   1   2   2   0   12  22    


Magnitude Distributions (Sept.12,14,15 - 04:00-06:04 UT - LM=6.5)

     0   1   2   3   4   5   6  total Ave.
STA  0   1   2   1   7   3   0   14   3.6
ATR  0   0   2   1   1   5   1   10   4.2
ARI  0   0   0   0   2   0   0    2   4.0
BTR  0   0   0   0   2   2   0    4   4.5
SET  0   1   1   1   1   0   0    4   2.5
NPX  1   0   2   1   1   0   0    5   2.2
SPX  0   0   0   0   0   0   0    0   N/A
SPO  1   4   9   6  10  19   1   50   3.6

Clear Skies,
GWG




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