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Re: (meteorobs) Obs. LANMA 15/16, 18/19 and 19/20 Aug

I am a meteor observer in St. Petersburg Florida. Myself and other members of
the St. Petersburg Astronomy Club try to observe as much as we can. Lately the
showers have been very disappointing. The night of Aug.12,1998  we observed
from a beach, at Sarasota Fl., we only saw 18 Perseids and 4 spurs. from the
hours of 9:38 est to 12:49 am. Most were very faint. The skies were very clear
and the rising moon did not  bother us until about 12:30 am.
It is great to hear from other observers from around the world.
Do you collect meteor?

meteorobs@latrade.com wrote:

> Hello everybody,
>
> Last week we did some observations on the kappa Cygnids and late Perseids
> from Biddinghuizen. 'We' are Koen (Miskotte), Casper (ter Kuile) and me
> of DMS team 'Delphinus'. Weather is still quite unstable however, so not
> each night has been really succesfull. We have been in the field on
> August 15/16, 18/19 and 19/20. Other nights have been clouded out.
> Below the data, and an impression. Kappa Cygnids were disappointing this
> year....
>
> August 15/16 was a very good, clear night. This was the first time we
> could observe under good conditions from our 'new' observing location
> which is about 4 km west of our previous location. We are very satisfied
> about our new site: a very dark sky, even under less good conditions. The
> light dome in the west-southwest is perhaps slightly more prominent, but
> the sky in the North, East and Zenith is even darker than the old
> location. And no direct lantern light, not even at distance.
> Like our Descanso friends, we also observe amidst sheeps (but the closest
> thing to a mountain lion is the kitten of the Appel family, that jumps on
> your sleeping bag at night, falling asleep in your leap making purring
> sounds...). These creatures make strange noises at night... One of the
> sheep has a cough that rivals that of a cigarette addict. Others make
> even weirder sounds.... Strange animals!
>
> A beautifull milky way was visible on 15/16, and during the moonless
> hours Lm reached +6.9. After moonrise this dropped, to +6.3, but still
> quite dark skies with milky way! This because the sky was very clean that
> night. After moonrise, I slept a while -not my usual habit, but I was
> very tired after last weeks hard and hectic work (I finally finished my
> M.A. last week, but as always: when I wanted to prepare and print the final
> draft, things went horibbly wrong with my pc... That induced 2 weeks of
> severe stress, that I had to pay for last days while observing....).
> This night also saw a beatifull close conjunction between the Moon and
> Aldebaran (15' for our location). I ended up with 113 meteors in 3.4
> hours. This night saw my 500th meteor of this year, a +4 Perseid.
> Teams to the east of us were less lucky: they remained under the remnants
> of a cold front all night which had passed the middle of the country late
> afternoon. Too bad for our photographic multistation network.
>
> August 18/19 was one of those nights that I hate: clear, but with
> continuous invading fields of clouds. Very annoying. After two hours of
> repeated breaks and restarts, we stopped. Back in De Bilt an hour
> later....the sky was extremely clear again.... Rats!
>
> August 19/20 started of very badly with heavy cirrus. No observations
> early that night, but later in the night it gradually cleared and we were
> able to observe under very modest conditions (and perhaps only thanks to
> the very favorable dark location). Only the last hour was actually quite
> good.
>
> During all 3 nights we saw nice late Perseid activity, some late
> Aquarids, but rather disappointing kappa Cygnid activity. Compared to
> e.g. the good show of 1993, this was really meagre....
>
> No firebals allas. In fact, both Koen and I haven't seen a true fireball
> (i.e. brighter than -4) this year so far, nothwithstanding some 70 hours
> (Koen) respectively 37 hours (me) observing so far.
> Below my data of last nights. I have now logged 628 meteors in 37.32
> hours effective over 18 nights this year.
>
> -Marco (DMS team Delphinus, The Netherlands)
>
> Observer: Marco Langbroek        LANMA
> Loc.: Biddinghuizen (the Netherlands) 52d 29' N, 5d 37'E
>
> date: August 15/16, 1998
>
> UT            Teff   Lm    Per   Cyg  iAqr dAqr  Spo
> 21:22-22:25   1.00   6.9    12    3    1    3    18
> 22:25-23:34   0.93   6.9     8    2    4    2    14
> 23:49-00:32   0.65   6.8    11    0    0    0    12
> 01:41-02:31   0.82   6.3    9     0    3    0    11
> TOTAL         3.40          40    5    8    5    55   113
>
> Date: August 18/18 1998
>
> 21:26-21:54   0.47   6.8    7    2    1    0    7
> 23:00-23:18   0.30   6.8    3    1    0    0    6
> TOTAL         0.77          10   3    1    0    13   27
>
> Date: August 19/20 1998
>
> UT            Teff   Lm    Per   Cyg   iAqr   SPo
> 21:40-22:14   0.57   6.4    1    2     0      8
> 00:05-01:08   1.05   6.4    9    0     1      9
> 01:08-02:09   0.90   6.3    6    0     2      10
> 02:09-02:50   0.58   6.4    6    0     1      12
> TOTAL         3.10         22    2     4      39    67
References: