[Prev][Next][Index][Thread]

Re: (meteorobs) Lynx activity Jan 04?



Sirko Molau wrote:
> 
> Hello Mike,
> 
> > I did observe 2 Lynx meteors, during my session, one at 0540 UT and one
> > at 0930 UT. I posted this information in my QUA report, too. I am very
> > confident they were from a radiant around 08h-09h and +55°, as opposed
> > to being just sporadics. Their path length to radiant ratio was around
> > 0.5, and the 2 paths intersected around the location I just specified.
> > One was mag 2, the other mag 1, and both were of medium velocity.
> >
> > I am wondering if anyone else saw any activity from this apparent
> > radiant?
> 
> how can you be 'very confident' that these were not sporadic meteors?
> Even if they match perfectly a radiant they still could be pure chance
> alignments, especially since you are talking about just _two_ meteors
> within several hours of observation.
> 
> Did you plot the meteors? That would be the only way to seriously
> combine your observation with others and do further investigations.
> Still, five or six plotted meteors are the _absolute_ minimum to really
> suspect a radiant, everything below that is just sporadic noise.
> Rainer Arlt once did some interesting computer simulations: He
> 'generated' meteors completely randomly and showed, how easy you may get
> 'new radiants' from chance alignments of two or three of those.
> 
> Best regards,
> Sirko Molau
> 

Dear Sirko,

I should have mentioned in my first post, that there were another 2 or 3
meteors which I classified as SPO, that seemed to come from the same
radiant in Lynx. I remember I had a difficult decision on how to
classify them, because they were at edge of my FOV, and I did not have
the confidence to trace back their trajectory with enough accuracy to
say they came from 08h +55°, nor could I determine them by the path
length criteria either, but they definitely came from that general area.

Also, another observer (STOEN) reported 1 Lynx meteor in 1.27 Teff,
about the same time as my observations. And, Bob Lunsford stated in his
weekly summary post, Dec 24th, there were scattered reports of activity
from Lynx during the last days of December. So, my gut feeling is that
these are all not just "chance alignments", but some real radiant around
maybe a 5° radius of 08h +55°.

Sincerely,
Mike Linnolt
To UNSUBSCRIBE from the 'meteorobs' email list, use the Web form at:
http://www.tiacdot net/users/lewkaren/meteorobs/subscribe.html

Follow-Ups: References: