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(meteorobs) Aug 31/Sept 1 Meteor Observations From California
As advertised I drove 50 miles east of San Diego to escape the coastal
low clouds and light pollution. There was still plenty of light
pollution inland from the bright waning gibbous moon. I found out that
I had to look way over in the northwest to totally escape direct moon-
light. This was too far from the Alpha Aurigid radiant so I decided to
face due north and accept the moon in the far right side of my vision.
The session lasted 4 hours and the first 3 were perfectly clear. The
last hour had some high clouds or smoke low in the east, out of my
field of view. For the most part activity was slow as there were gaps
as long as 34 and 31 minutes during the last 2 hours where no activity
at all was seen. Yet during the last hour there were simultaneous
meteors that just missed crossing one another. A slow 1st magnitude
meteor traveling north and a swift zero magnitude meteor with a train
traveling west occurred at precisely the same instant. This was
definitely the highlight of the session.
No Alpha Aurigid activity was seen during the first two hours.
The predicted time of maximum activity was at 11:36, just into the last
hour. The only two Alpha Aurigids seen during the entire session
occurred at 11:26 and 11:28, just minutes before the prediction. Talk
about a sharp peak!
There were other events that made up for the lack of Alpha Aurigid
activity. First of all the only satellite seen during the session may
have crossed the moon. It was never brighter than 3rd magnitude and
dimmed to 4th before reaching the moon. It was impossible to actually
see just how close it passed as the lunar glare overwhelmed it. My
estimate was that is just passed inside the eastern limb.
The second interesting event was the amount of activity seen coming
from Taurus. I could not pinpoint the exact area out in the field but I
did noticed at least 3 bright, trained meteors that missed the AUR
radiant and came from an area south of Auriga. Once at home I was able
to trace the plots and found a sharp radiant at 69 (4:36) +21 which
produced 4 meteors. This may not seem like much but if the radiant is
stretched to 10 degrees in diameter the number of possible members grows
to 10 which is one third of the entire night's activity. This possible
radiant lies within the "V" of Taurus just a few degrees north of the
bright orange star Aldebaran. All of the possible members were swift
with the brightest members producing trains. This may be an area to
watch for the next few days and in years to come.
Lastly, that reading of 3 percent humidity at the end of the session is
not a misprint. A light wind came out of the desert during the last part
of the session making it bone dry. There was certainly no problem with
dew tonight!
August 31/September 1 1999
0830-0930 UT 0.94 6.32 0 AUR 7 SPO 7 TOTAL
0930-1030 UT 0.94 6.35 0 AUR 8 SPO 8 TOTAL
1030-1130 UT 0.94 6.26 2 AUR 6 SPO 8 TOTAL
1130-1230 UT 0.96 5.90 0 AUR 7 SPO 7 TOTAL
TOTALS: 3.78 6.21 2 AUR 28 SPO 30 TOTAL
The first column gives the period watched stated in Universal Time (UT)
which is PDT + 7 hours. The second column gives the percent of that
particular hour actually spent observing the sky. Time was lost for
plotting and data entry tonight. The third column gives the average
limiting magnitude estimated during each period with a minimum of 4
estimates using at least 2 and preferably 3 different sky areas close to
my center of view. The last several columns list the activity seen
during each period.
I was facing due North at an altitude of 60 degrees for the first three
hours then Northeast during the last hour. No breaks were taken during
this session. AUR = Alpha Aurigids and SPO = Sporadic (random activity).
Beginning Temperature/Relative Humidity: 54 F (12 C) 24%
Ending " " " 54 F (12 C) 3%
MAGNITUDES:
AUR: 0 (1) +1 (1) AVERAGE: +0.50
SPO: -1 (1) 0 (4) +1 (7) +2 (3) +3 (6) +4 (6) +5 (1) AVERAGE: +2.11
Bob Lunsford
San Diego, CA USA
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