(meteorobs) Observation October 23/24 2011

Pierre Martin pmartin at teksavvy.com
Tue Nov 29 00:25:41 EST 2011


Due to poor weather, I managed to get out only once for this year's  
Orionids.  Even on then, I managed less than 3 hours, due to clouding  
over skies.  The transparency was 2/5 or below average, and the  
temperature was near freezing.  It was quite an enjoyable session  
though, with decent Orionids rates.  Just five minutes into my watch,  
a spectacular earthgrazing sporadic was seen.  It came out of the  
north-east, reaching mag -2 as it shot a persistent 50 degrees path!   
It changed from yellow to orange as it climbed on an angle against the  
horizon, and left a train persisting for a few seconds.  This was  
definitely one of the more dramatic meteors that I've seen this year!   
This followed just a minute later by a bright mag -1 blue-green  
Orionid near its radiant.

Several members of the Orionids were seen over the next several  
minutes despite a low radiant.  This raised my hopes of an unusually  
good showing.  However, the Orionids did not get any more active as  
the night went on.

The strangest meteor was an Orionid at 1:31AM EDT.  It was a very  
faint mag +5 streak that actually left a visible and very noticeable  
wake.

Pierre Martin
Ottawa, Ontario



DATE: October 23/24 2011
BEGIN: 04:00 UT (00:00 EDT) END: 06:42 UT (02:42 EDT)
OBSERVER: Pierre Martin (MARPI)
LOCATION: Long: -75.092 West; Lat: 45.568 North
Observing site: Pendleton Airport, Ontario, CANADA
RECORDING METHOD: talking clock/tape recorder, plotting
----------------------------------------------------------

OBSERVED SHOWERS:
October Ursa Minorids (OUI) - 18:18 (275) +75
Northern Taurids (NTA) - 02:48 (042) +20
Southern Taurids (STA) - 02:51 (043) +11
Eta Taurids(ETT) - 03:42 (056) +24
Orionids (ORI) - 06:28 (97) +16
Epsilon Geminids (EGE) - 07:02 (105) +27
Leo Minorids (LMI) - 10:43 (161) +36
SPO (sporadics)
----------------------------------------------------------

OBSERVING PERIODS: 0 = none seen; / = shower not observed

PERIOD(UT)___FIELD_____Teff___LM____SPO_ORI_NTA_STA_EGE_LMI_OUI_ETT

04:00-05:00__030 +08___1.00___6.25___6__10___2___4___0___/___0___0
05:00-06:00__048 +09___1.00___6.25___3__12___2___3___1___/___0___0
06:02-06:42__065 +07___0.66___6.25___0___7___2___1___0___1___0___0

TOTALS:________________2.66__________9__29___6___8___1___1___0___0  =   
54

Notes: The first column (Period UT) refers to observing periods, 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) Teff is  
simply the total time during the observing session spent actually  
watching the sky. Breaks and/or dead time are not included in the  
reported Teff. It is reported in decimal format such that a 60 minute  
observing session would be reported as Teff = 1.00. The column (LM) is  
the average naked eye limiting magnitude seen.  All following columns  
indicate the number of meteors for each shower observed.  For more  
info, see: http://www.namnmeteors.org/guidechap2.html
------------------------

MAGNITUDE DISTRIBUTIONS:

SHOWER
_____-2__-1___0__+1__+2__+3__+4__+5______AVE

ORI___0___1___2___5___6___4___7___4_____+2.62
SPO___1___0___0___0___1___4___3___0_____+2.66
STA___0___0___0___0___2___2___3___1_____+3.38
NTA___0___0___0___0___0___3___2___1_____+3.66
EGE___0___0___0___0___0___0___1___0_____+4.00
LMI___0___0___0___0___0___1___0___0_____+3.00

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  
(IMO definition). The above table contains the magnitudes from all  
observed meteors, and the average (last column) for showers.
------------------------

SKY OBSCURED (FOV) (UT):  none

------------------------

Dead time: None

Breaks (UT): 6:00-02

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