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Re: (meteorobs) Does this shower exist?
In a message dated 10/11/99 9:44:08 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
rmn@aaocbn.aaodot gov.au writes:
<< Last Friday, I found a new comet (as yet unannounced) that seems to be
about 13 months from perihelion. Currently around the distance of
Jupiter, the comet will have perihelion close to the Earth's orbit. Sadly
it will be on the far side of the Sun! The orbit is still very uncertain,
but from the short arc, it appears to be best fitted by a parabola.
However, this doesn't discount the possibility of meteors, and I wondered
if there was any evidence of meteors having been seen roughly around March
19 from a radiant at roughly RA 60 deg Dec -25 deg. Despite the low
evening elongation, these meteors would be fast. This would only really
be a southern hemisphere shower, and is basically a daytime shower.
It won't surprise me that the extended orbital arc will give the nodal
distance too far from the Earth's orbit for any meteors, but when the
orbit is published today (?) by the Central Bureau, inevitably someone
will pick up the possibility of meteors.
Cheers, Rob
PS As I'm very tired, I wouldn't trust any details I give here (standard
disclaimer)!
Robert H. McNaught
rmn@aaocbn.aaodot gov.au >>
First -- congratulations to Rob for being the co-discoverer of this new comet
(McNaught-Hartley C/1999 T1). After getting the latest orbital elements off
of MPEC 1999-T42, I attempted to answer Rob's question concerning possible
meteor activity associated with this comet.
From what I was able to determine, the comet will reach the ascending node of
its orbit on 2000 December 22.9 (UT) at a distance of 1.173 a.u. from the
Sun. The Earth will pass to within 0.176 a.u. of this point roughly 89.4
days later (2001 March 22.3 UT); Earth being inside the comet orbit. As for
the radiant for any possible meteors, I myself found it to be far to the
south -- perhaps somewhere down in the region around the constellations
Octans or Apus. Definetely far out of the reach for us northerners!
On another note -- although this comet will remain well to the south prior to
perihelion, it will move rapidly north and east toward the end of 2000 and
into early 2001 and will arrive at perigee (closest to Earth) around 2001
January 29 in southern Hercules. It will then be 1.403 a.u. from the Sun and
1.338 a.u. from Earth. If it brightens along the lines of the standard (for
most comets) inverse fourth-power law, we might expect it to be shining
around magnitude 9.2 around that time.
-- joe rao
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