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Re: (meteorobs) What? A Leonid storm in *1886*?!?
In a message dated 3/28/00 11:43:00 AM Eastern Standard Time,
dfischer@astro.uni-bonndot de writes:
<< In the current issue of the journal Nature (issue of 23 March 2000 p. 345)
a short article is quoted from the issue of 22 March 1900 - in which a reader
described a meteor storm on November 15, 1886, that he had observed from
Shanghai. What other than the Leonids could have been responsible for that?
>>
My first impression was that perhaps this might have been a display of the And
romedids/Bielids shower that was perhaps mis-dated. On November 27, 1885 the
Andromedids produced a spectacular display which H.A. Newton declared
produced a maximum hourly rate of 75,000 which corresponds to roughly
November 27.8 UT.
However . . . in some of the earlier versions of his very popular
Astronomical Calendar, Guy Ottewell would speak of the maximum of Leonid
activity occurring not only near the times when the parent comet
(Tempel-Tuttle) was at perihelion, but around the times of its aphelion as
well! Over the past several years, the meteor section of Ottewell's annual
publication has been handled by Allistair McBeath. However, as an example,
here is what Ottewell himself wrote about the Leonids in his 1984 edition:
"A mostly sparse stream but with a huge swarm behind the comet, another at
the opposite end of the orbit, and perhaps others . . . "
I never understood from this statement why Ottewell had suggested that great
Leonid showers were possible when Tempel-Tuttle was near aphelion.
Was this supposed 1886 Leonid display what Ottewell was alluding to in his
above comment?
-- joe rao
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