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Re: (meteorobs) Yes, the Delta Cancrids exist...
>I am in the process of redetermining some of the orbits and adding
>more details of recent observations...
>
>Check your records when you get a chance and let me know what minor
>meteor streams on my web site you have or have not seen?
I'll gladly do that, Gary - though my plotting efforts are meager
compared to those of some of our more experienced readers...
By the way, one thing which would assist visual observers and plotters
a lot in doing these checks, would be if your site presented the
observing specifics for each shower (so far as they're known) in a
convenient, consistently-placed tabular form! This is certainly one of
the best features of the IMO's Calendar for their Working List: a
single group of well-organized tables, detailing most of what a
plotter needs to know about all potential showers on a given date.
Things which would be key for such tables (to my mind): Activity
dates; Most likely maximum date(s); Radiant RA/Dec (or lambda/alpha)
THROUGHOUT the activity period - or if only at maximum, then at least
some estimate of nightly radiant drift for ALL showers; Geocentric
velocity - this is a VITAL confirmation for shower associations! (I do
believe geocentric velocity is calculable whenever orbital elements
are available. And even estimating it to the nearest 10 km/s makes a
big difference in the statistical certainty of shower associations...)
Other data which are clearly less important but may be useful include:
Radiant scatter (or some estimate of "radiant size" - which for poorly
observed minor showers is certainly not a given!); Meteor brightness,
especially if something like an "r" factor (a la IMO) is known for the
shower; Parent body if any good prospects exist. I'd also love to see
some statistical measures of meteor color, too, although I gather most
observers don't see any value in these currently.
Of course, often some of these data are included in Gary's shower
write-ups already. But what's missing is a convenient way to access
all this data for many showers at once in a given period, something I
find helps reduce my data-analysis time immensely!
Well, a 7am flight and cloudy weather will keep me from plotting
tonight! Clear skies and good luck to those who CAN go out...
Lew
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