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(meteorobs) Radiant motions et al...



Wayne et al -

>In fact, the latest edition of the IMO handbook has just such charts!

OK, I have the old edition, 1989.  Who do I contact, and how much, for the
new edition??  

>I also produce for my snail mail readers of Radiant Rising, charts 
>containing all active showers during each lunar period (Full moon to Full), 
>based on the aforementioned IMO handbook, as well as radiants from other 
>sources including Peter Jenniskens paper for the DMS, and Gary Kronk's 
>historical listing.

Please add me to your snail mail list!!

>In actual fact, when you start plotting all the radiants from the N & 
>S delta Aquarids, N & S iota-Aquarids, alpha-Capricornids etc, when they 
>are concurrently active, you can truly appreciate the difficult task of 
>separating members of these showers. 

Hmmm. Yes.  I see your point.  What I did early Saturday afternoon was sit
down with my handy Norton's and plot out all the radiants I was supposed to
be looking for on the Sunday morning.  Then, when I set up for observing, I
deliberately faced south, so as to have those radiants right in front of me,
or in the left or right side of my field of view, and I carefully took some
time to go over each of them again.  Most of what I saw were sporadics (23
of my 33 meteors).  I did not plot, but was careful about the radiant
points.  I called 2 alpha CAP's, 2 JPE's, 1 SDA, 1 SAG, and 4 Perseids - and
I will stick to my calls on those. 

>it is my personal belief that beginning/novice observers should only report
a generic AQR (for Aquarids), but that thought is just simmering.

Possibly a valid point.  If I wasn't looking right at those radiants, I
wouldn't have had a chance of trying to separate them!  Likewise, if they'd
been below the horizon. 

>Re:  Perseids... Based on the IMO information, projecting the radiant
backward in time 
to July 5/6 th (when I also observed), the radiant would be RA 001 degree (0
Hr 4 min), Decl + 49.  FWIW, in 1.7 hours of looking for these early
Perseids (July 5/6) I saw 
none.... 

I will stick to my guns on my Perseid calls! ;))

>I also observed 0ne JPE (July Pegasid), whose velocity is nearly 
identical to the Perseids..dot be sure the ones you saw do not align with that 
radiant (which was 339d [22 Hr 34 m], +14) since they are easy to confuse.

Point taken (and observed)!

- Cathy
  Great White North