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(meteorobs) Leonids (11/17/97)
After over 5 weeks of mostly cloudy conditions (not a crystal clear night
to be found), the skies cleared on the afternoon of November 16. By
evening, the skies were beautiful. I waived my long-anticipated next chance
at observing comets and opted to go to bed early so I could take a crack at
the Leonids.
I never use an alarm, and woke up at 3:45 a.m. on the 17th (9:45 UT). I
bundled up since the temperature was 14 degrees F and began my session at 4
a.m. (10:00 UT). The moonlight was quite bright and I opted to put my lawn
chair in the shadow of my house. This restricted my view to about 60
percent of the sky. My feet were pointing eastward and the center of my
field of view was a few degrees north of the "sickle" of Leo.
Activity was quite low at first. I didn't see my first meteor until 4:11
a.m. (10:11 UT) and the first Leonid appeared at 4:28 a.m. (10:28 UT). A
sporadic appeared a few seconds after that Leonid.
As the cold worked its way through my layers of clothing, another dead
period followed; but at 4:37 a.m. (10:37 UT) everything changed. Four
Leonids appeared within about 15 seconds, each heading in different
directions and two being very short-trailed. Additional Leonids appeared at
10:38 (mag. 2), 10:39 (mag. 3), 10:41 (mag. -4), and 10:42 (mag. -1). The
last two left trains lasting 5 seconds and 4 seconds, respectively. There
was a three minute lag until the next meteor appeared, a sporadic, and then
the event of the night happened.
My toes were really starting to freeze after the sporadic and I stood up
from my lawn chair. I walked over to the door, turned and looked up. The
time was 10:46 UT, and a -5 or -6 fireball suddenly appeared just east of
Omicron Leonis. I was looking right at it and followed its rapid, but short
movement. Just before it ended, it flashed like a flashbulb and briefly lit
up the already moonlit sky. I estimated this terminal burst as between
magnitude -10 and -12, although I have not had a lot of experience
estimating such bright magnitudes in an already bright sky. The interesting
thing is that, since I was looking right at it, I saw what I could best
describe as a starlike dot which left an impression on my retina for about
a half second. I saw the meteor burn out, but the dot briefly remained. My
impression of this was that it was......weird...but certainly very
interesting. There is a chance the dot was actually the meteor after having
become so intense. The meteor left a train which persisted for about 4
minutes, the longest I have ever seen. The straight train slowly distorted
and after a minute it seemed almost the same luminosity as when it first
appeared, although it was now S-shaped. The early part of the train faded,
while the latter part (western portion) continued to be distorted. By the
end of 4 minutes it was barely visible to the naked eye as a semi-circle
with a diameter of nearly 4 degrees.
Additional Leonids appeared at 10:49, 11:02, 11:06, 11:09, 11:11, 11:12,
and 11:14. The one at 11:06 was unusual as it "sparkled." Don't asked me to
explain this one, I just guess it was flickering. Its magnitude was about
1. The meteors at 11:09 and 11:11 were magnitudes -2 and -3, respectively,
with the former leaving a 2 second train. No further meteors were seen and
at 11:25, with twilight beginning to strongly affect the sky, I ended the
session.
Sincerely,
Gary W. Kronk
Troy, Illinois