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(meteorobs) Recording Meteor Times
I recalled someone mentioning earlier that they don't list individual meteor
times but rather interval times. I was just reading IMO's new handbook for
meteor observers and noted at the bottom of page 61 the following: "Unless
you are going to photograph meteors or a fireball appears, the time of
individual meteors is of little interest, since you set time labels for each
30 minutes into your notes". Well, I totally disagree with this procedure.
I believe every meteor should have an hour and minute listed. The reason
is, unless meteor showers restrict their activity to that of the beginning
and end of any particular hour, you can easily miss the most active hour and
come up with lesser rates. The most active period of a shower may stagger
any 30 minute interval.
Recording an active shower like the Perseids at 1/2 hour intervals would give
one ZHR for an hour, but if you go by the most active hour based on recorded
meteor times, a higher ZHR may be noted because of a bunching up of meteors
within a recorded period. 1/2 hour time recordings averages the activity for
that period and not give an accurate indication of the most active moments.
Now if rates get appreciably too high where it becomes impossible to record
the times of every meteor, time intervals would be the appropriate thing.
Even then if possible, the intervals should probably be 5, 10 or 15 minutes.
Starting with the lesser interval and only going to the longer period as
activity forces you.
George Z.
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