Hi all, Just received this in... Kevin K ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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- To: burke@surfsouth.com
- Subject: Lunar impact seen & videorecorded; more records sought
- From: Joan and David Dunham <dunham@erols.com>
- Date: Sun, 21 Nov 1999 21:30:48 -0500
Brian Cudnik, Houston, Texas, saw a brief flash near the center of the Moon's dark side near the edge at about 4h 46m 20s U.T. November 18. Observing with a 36cm telescope, he estimated that the flash, taking a fraction of a second, was at least as bright as nearby 4th-mag. psi1 Aqr. He is sure of the event, but asked me for confirmation, to see if a satellite glint or other close-to-Earth phenomenon might have been involved. The observation was confirmed in a video recording that I made using a 13cm telescope at George Varros' home in Mount Airy, Maryland, with relatively dark skies about 35 miles northwest of Washington, DC. The event occurred at a cusp angle of around 75 - 80N (10 to 15 deg. north of the lunar equator) 1.7' from the Moon's edge. The flash, timed from the videotape at 4h 46m 15s, is visible in only two video frames, the first at about 3rd magnitude and the second at about 8th magnitude. The images can be viewed at http://iota.jhuapldot edu. The object was probably a Leonid since the peak of this year's display was at 2h UT as seen from the Earth. The trailing Moon would arrive at the same solar longitude about 3h later, near the time of the observed impact. I also recorded 5 lunar occultations of 8th-magnitude stars an hour before the impact, and also have an image of psi1 Aqr on the tape. Analysis of those images and of the impact images will permit a reasonably good determination of the brightness and location of the impact flash. Anyone else who was recording the dark side of the Moon at the above time should check their data and report their results to me, preferably at both dunham@erols.com and david.dunham@jhuapldot edu. I am interested in knowing about ALL observations of the lunar dark side made between 4:00 and 6:00 UT November 18th when the Moon should have been struck by the brunt of the Leonid storm. There are other fainter flashes in my video record, but some of them are spurious video artifacts. I looked at one, and it did not have the strong stellar appearance of the 4:46:15 flash. But before checking very much for other events, I want to know if there are any other observations that might confirm them. Unfortunately, I'm affraid that most observers in the central and western USA, where the Moon was best placed at the time, bypassed the evening lunar observations in favor of seeing the Leonid meteors during the early morning hours; I have heard of only a few lunar attempts. At my location, fortunately conditions were excellant with the Moon 15 deg. above the horizon at 4:46 UT. I was able to continue the observations until 5:30 UT. I believe this is the first confirmed lunar impact observation. A probable lunar meteor impact was photographed on 1953 November 15 by Dr. Leon Stuart; see http://www.spiritdot net.au/~minnah/LunarFlare.html. David Dunham, IOTA, 1999 Nov 21 Joan and David Dunham 7006 Megan Lane Greenbelt, MD 20770 (301) 474-4722 dunham@erols.com
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