(meteorobs) March 11/12 observations from North Florida

[Paul Jones]

Greetings all,
     I decided to take advantage of the relatively mild and very clear late
winter conditions this past weekend to get out and log my first meteor
observing session away from a major shower in quite some time indeed.  I
decided to take a shot at looking for a couple of the obscure and lesser
known radiants on the IMO and IAU Meteor Data Center lists.
     The ones that caught my fancy on the IAU MDC webpage were: the North
alpha Leonids (NAL, #39) and the March Cassiopeiids (MCA, #127).  The NAL's
max was Mar. 10/11 and the MCA's max was Mar. 11/12.  Also, I wanted to see
if there might be any lingering f Herculids (FHE, #345) from their max
around Mar. 8/9.  And, of course, the ever present Anthelion radiant as it
migrated into western Virgo.
     I decided to shoot for the midnight timeframe after moonset as the ANT
and the NAL radiants would be high and dry in the sky and still keep the FHE
radiant in good shape in the northeastern sky.  I never was quite sure where
the MCA radiant was, I figured it must have been passing under the pole at
that time.  Anyway, I logged two relaxing, enjoyable and fairly productive
hours, bagging 19 meteors, along with three ANTs and a possible NAL to
boot!  Here's the data:

Date:  March 11/12, 2011  5:25 - 7:25 UT (12:25 - 2:25 a.m. EST)
5 miles SW of St. Augustine, Florida, USA ; 29.9 N lat, 81.33 W long  10
meters elevation
Temperature: 43 degrees Farenheit

First period:
5:25 - 6:25 UT; Teff=1.00, Lm=6.2  30% horizon obstruction (trees)
NAL - 1
ANT - 1
SPO - 7
Total - 9 meteors

Second period:
6:25 - 7:25 UT; Teff=1.00, Lm=6.2  30% horizon obstruction (trees)
ANT - 2
SPO - 8
Total - 10 meteors

Magnitudes:

NAL - +3 (1)

ANT - +3 (1) +4 (2)

SPOR - +3 (5) +4 (6) +5 (4)

Yes, none of the 19 meteors I saw during the session were brighter than 3rd
magnitude!  Where the heck are all these green (and other color) fireballs
folks seem to be seeing so many of lately anyway?   Only one or two of them
were longer than three degrees in path length.  I'm just glad I was alert
and wide awake, cause if I hadn't been, I would've been hurting in the rate
department, big time!  Shoot, they don't call this the Meteor Doldrums for
nothing, do they...;o)?
The NAL was a short two degrees in path length in southern Leo and lined up
very well with the RA 159, Dec. +31 radiant and even showed a slow apparent
speed (they are listed at 9 miles per second).  I suppose it coud easily
have been a chance sporadic line up and I didn't see another, but the slow
speed was very evident and caused me to ID it as an NAL.  I was just
surprised to see anything come even close to lining up with that radiant!
I saw another nice +3 medium speed meteor shoot WSW between Virgo and the
tail of Leo and I did my best to line it up with the f Herculid radiant, but
it just wouldn't do it, so I called it a sporadic.    All three of the ANTS
were very short pathed as well and very close to the projected radiant that
Bob Lunsford's report mentioned.  I would be mighty impressed indeed with
any video system that could have captured some of the dinky little meteors I
managed to catch during this session!
I'm determined to keep checking out the favorable minor radiants from the
IMO and IAU listings, whether they are confirmed or not, just to see if I
can possibly spot any.  I always try to keep in mind that tendency to "see
what you are looking for" when I get out and am extremely critical of
calling anything unless I am just about darned convinced it is possibly one
of the meteors from a given radiant.  I've made a spreadsheet that
summarizes the two main meteor sources together and throws in a few older,
historical listings I've come across.  I credit Wayne Halley's awesome
radiant drift migration spreadsheet with inspiring me to make it.  If anyone
would like to have it to just let me know at jonesp0854 at gmail.com and I'd be
happy to send it to you via email attachment.

Clear skies and green fireballs to all, Paul in St. Augustine, Florida