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

Re: (meteorobs) Meteor paths & southern hemisphere.



> Do we have any meteor shower 'pairs' resulting from the intersection of
> earths orbit with one cometary trail?

The most prominent example is Comet 1P/Halley causing the
eta-Aquarids in May and the Orionids in October. We don't
see real dust trails here, since the distance between the
orbits of Earth and Comet are large at both nodes. We always
see quite old material (>10 revs) which has drifted to
orbits actually intersecting with the Earth's orbit. This
is particularly valid for the Orionids; the ascending node of 
Halley is extremely far from 1 AU, and it is almost a peculiar
case of orbital dynamics that we see a good deal of the
meteoroids at all.

Another example is the Taurids which have a companion daytime 
shower in June (beta Taurids). The parent object of the Taurids 
is often quoted as being Comet 2P/Encke. But as we face an
ecliptical shower, the number of objects with similar orbital
parameters is large. It may therefore be wise to say that 
'a fraction of Taurids' was ejected from Encke. Anyway, that
fraction will be another example of a double-intersection with
a cometary orbit.  
(By the way in the sense of ecliptical sources, we observe
the autumnal Taurids as the Anthelion source, the daytime
beta-Taurids as the Helion source.)


Rainer


-- 
Rainer Arlt  --  Astrophysikalisches Institut Potsdam -- www.aipdot de
Visual Commission - International Meteor Organization -- www.imodot net
rarlt@aipdot de --  phone: +49-331-7499-533  --  fax: +49-331-7499-526
To UNSUBSCRIBE from the 'meteorobs' email list, use the Web form at:
http://www.tiacdot net/users/lewkaren/meteorobs/subscribe.html

References: