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(meteorobs) Quads & the Great White North...From Cathy

Okay...just got home from a three day stinct at work. It's tuesday morning and
I find this message from our stranded friend Cathy Hall. 
George Zay

----------------
George -

Hi there!  Please post this to meteorobs for me <Monday morning> your
time!  Thanks...

- Cathy

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Greetings All!

Thought I'd send a report as to recent observations... I have been
travelling and away from Ottawa since December 11th.  By the way, Happy
New Year all!

My parents invited me out to British Columbia for Christmas.. so I took
them up on their kind offer of a ticket! :)  So.. off to B.C. I went for
20 days to enjoy... almost 20 days of rain!!  Needless to say, Geminids
were only in my dreams! 

I did manage to renew some old acquaintances, though, and took in a tour
and show at the Vancouver Planetarium.  The displays were interesting...
even had a huge (about a foot by 6 inch) piece of meteorite -
unlabelled!!  I must drop them a note to tell them to put a sign on
it... While chatting to an older gentleman also looking at the
meteorite, and chatting about meteors, found out he had even heard of
George Zay... small world! ;)

Seeing as how I was on the west side of the continent anyway... decided
to take a short detour on the way home... :))  San Diego!  So... I
contacted the crew down there... and managed to tag along on the
Quadrantid trip to the Mojave!!!  Wow.  This was my first Quadrantid
shower in all the years I've observed.  We always got clouded out in
Ottawa...   

Summary of results as follows:  (I tried to get this posted earlier via
a friend, but was informed today it probably didn't get through due to
massive power failures in Ontario)

Jan. 1/2/98, Barstow, CA:
10.50-13.00 UT, 2hr.10min.
3 QUA, 4 COM, 0 DCA, 26 SPO, Total:  33 meteors

Jan. 2/3/98, Yermo, CA:
12.55-14.00 UT, 1hr.5min.
28 QUA, 4 COM, 0 DCA, 19 SPO, Total:  51 meteors

Jan. 3/4/98, Yermo, CA:
9.20-13.45 UT, 4hr.25min.
9 QUA, 16 COM, 2 DCA, 62 SPO, Total:  89 meteors

Jan. 6/7/98, Descanso Observatory, CA:
9.40-13.00 UT, 3hr.20min.
8 QUA, 8 COM, 2 DCA, 38 SPO, Total:  56 meteors

Full reports will be sent to Mark Davis as soon as I can.

The trip into the desert was wonderful - meteor observing by night, rock
collecting by day...  My luggage (I am still in transit...) is much
heavier going home! :)

Back in San Diego, after the desert sojourn, Joseph Assmus was kind
enough to provide me accommodation... and I spent the next 3 days being
shown the sites of the city by Joseph, George Zay, and Bob Lunsford.  I
visited George's observatory both by day... gee, that's high off the
ground ;) and by night.  

I was surprised that the desert was actually quite chilly at night for
observing... and at George's observatory on the Tuesday night, the
temperature dropped to 21F!!  I was very glad I had taken my full winter
observing gear... well, maybe not all the layers (the Great White North
does get a tad cooler! :))  

It was also very neat to see Omega Centauri rising in the morning sky...
we are at 45 North up home, and San Diego is a southerly 32 North...  It
just hung in the morning sky, and was huge to the naked eye...!

And, of course, I got to actually meet some of the meteor crew who I had
only known by name!!  It was most interesting... :))  As mentioned
above, I met Joseph Assmus, George Zay, Bob Lunsford, and also Dave
Holman.  I would never, of course, embarrass any of them in tales of my
visit... :) Right! ;)  What can I say... Sorry, George... you get first
comments!!  George was wonderful... quiet, soft-spoken, wonderful sense
of humour.. and very dashing! ;))  Bob was the reserved one, relaxed,
laid back, nice laugh...  Joseph was talkative, but I dare say, I
managed to get words in edge-wise! ;)  Dave Holman was quiet and
introspective..

Meteor-wise, what did I learn?  Well... I have started recording DCV,
distance from centre of view.... and length of meteors.  I gather that
the recording forms that we use will be changing, and that these may be
included on the reports...  It was informative to see how my magnitude
estimates agreed to the other observers, and also how my perception
agreed or differed.  I have also realized that I need more practice
calling magnitudes on very bright meteors, which we see few of up here
in Canada (although this is probably a factor related to number of hours
we are able to observe...).

I didn't plot while down in California, and ran tape recorder as opposed
to manual recording.  I was impressed at the speed of plotting that the
other observers did.

Anyway, I'd like to thank Joseph, George, and Bob for a really wonderful
visit... they all went out of their way to show me a truly memorable
time! 

And.. Am I home yet?  Nope. I flew out of San Diego Wednesday night,
January 7th... and got stranded at the airport in Toronto, Canada on the
way home.  Ottawa, Kingston, and Montreal have been declared disaster
areas due to the worst ice storm this century!!!  They have very little
power, heat, or water in the region... hundreds of thousands are without
power... thousands of trees and hydro poles are down... the army has
been sent in to help with relief... and hydro workers from all acrosss
eastern Canada and the northeastern U.S. have come to our rescue...!! 
It will be weeks before everything is restored.  

My sister and her family live just south of the city.  They are huddling
around their fireplace for warmth... no power now for a week... most of
the 30-40 trees in their backyard have been severed in half.. they are
getting water from the local fire station...  and surviving on canned
foods cooked over the fire.  The excitement on their street this week
was the army moving in to bring several portable generators for
neighbours whose houses were flooding :(  The whole region is like
this...

So.. I am still in Toronto.  There are no planes, trains, or buses
running to Ottawa.  The main highways are closed.  I am hoping for maybe
a flight out on Tuesday... and I hear my area in town has some power. 
Several friends of mine in Toronto are putting me up - Andreas Gada and
his wife, Bonnie Bird.

In the meantime, I will work on getting my full meteor reports sent down
to NAMN...

I hope all of you have had better weather, and clear skies...  

Signing off for now, in transit...

- Cathy
  Marooned in the Great White North
  temporary address:  nyaa@interlog.com
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