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(meteorobs) Puzzling Report: June Bootids in 1990



For those interested,

As a result of the recent June Bootids activity, I received the below
rather puzzling report about apparent activity from this shower in 1990.
The observer is an amateur astronomer (not accustomed to regular meteor
observing), but even taking this into account, there are some discrepencies
between this report and the known June Bootids.  Namely, the meteors he
describes are very swift, most leaving trains, while the June Bootids are
extremely slow.  Also the known June Bootid radiant is quite diffuse, while
the one described here is more discrete.  The rates reported here are
*extremely* high as well.  Nonetheless, the report is intriguing:

From: <KLOATMAN@aol.com>
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1998 22:30:21 EDT
To: richardson@digitalexp.com
Subject: Subject: JUNE BOOTIDS 1990 Outburst (Storm) - June 25/26.09375
X-Mailer: AOL 3.0 16-bit for Windows sub 38

Subject: JUNE BOOTIDS 1990 Outburst (Storm) - June 25/26.09375

After seeing your postings regarding the June Bootids 1998 and reviewing  my
records and the newsletters of the Mid Hudson Astronomy I would like to report
the following. It may be a bit late to report but on the evening of June 25/26
1990, I observed a shower with a radiant from between iota Hercules , Vega,
and the head of Draco (RA 220° Declination 48°).

My observing records are as follows: While observing from my dark suburban
backyard at 9:30 PM to 10:30 PM Eastern Daylight Time (GMT-4:00) and looking
to the northeast I saw many meteors which were very very fast, leaving short
wide bluish white trains that lasted .5 to 1 second each. The rate was 20 to
40 per minute at about fifth magnitude, peaking at 10:15 PM (2:15 UT of 6/26)
when there were 40 to 50 meteors in the sky simultaneously with the radiant
plainly visible. There were two types of meteors. The most prevalent (95%) had
1° long trains that lasted .5 to 1 second. The others (5%) were the same color
and speed but the trains were much thinner and 20° long , beginning further
from the radiant. The seeing was the best I had ever experienced at this site,
with a limiting magnitude of 5.5 and a three day old Moon. The site is located
in Poughkeepsie, New York, USA at 41.67°N, 73.83°W which is approximately 120
km north of New York City, with a mountain range in-between. 65% of the sky
was obstructed by buildings and trees.

I also counted 9 meteors with a radiant from Ophiuchus which had yellow medium
width trains 7° to 10° long and lasting 3 to 4 seconds.

Since this was the only meteor storm I had ever seen, I called four other
members of the Mid Hudson Astronomy Association at 10:31 PM EDT. Unfortunately
I got answering machines and a family member who promised to relay the
message. When they responded the following day three confirmed that the seeing
had been excellent. Two said there had been a lot of meteors but they had not
seen the storm. Robert Horton of  Woodstock, New York (50 km north of my site)
reported in our July 1990 Newsletter “ I was able to see several of these fast
faint objects (from an area near the head of Hercules) before the clear skies
forced me to get my telescope out and do some deep sky observing”. The third
member, John Bortle of Stormville, New York checked his log and said he spent
the night observing variable stars at his observatory 16 km east of my site.

I hope this is of some value to you.

Karl Loatman, President, Mid Hudson Astronomy Association, 31 Bushwick Rd.,
Poughkeepsie, NY 12603 USA
e-mail kloatman@aol.com


* end of message

Take care, all,


Jim Richardson
American Meteor Society