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(meteorobs) November 17/18 Leonids (Ontario, CAN) - narrative report



Here's my report about the amazing night with the 2000 Leonid 
outburst as seen from eastern Ontario...

I was determined to do whatever I could to catch this year's Leonids 
despite the bright moonlight and generally poor November weather. The 
evening of November 17 initially did not look promising at all for 
any kind of Leonid observing effort here. As Joe Rao pointed out, all 
of eastern Ontario would be plagued by Lake effect cloud cover 
resulting in broken overcast skies at best, unless one was willing to 
travel down south. The local forecasters were barely more optimistic 
calling for variable clouds and chance of flurries. The GOES-8 
satellite showed no hope whatsoever except for a tiny sucker hole 
just south-west of Ottawa that would probably come and go quickly.

The temperature plunged down to -3C in mid-afternoon and strong winds 
pushed the windchill factor down to -7C! Soon after suppertime that 
evening, the sky outside my window was 100% overcast, without any 
breaks. Weather reports also had scattered snow flurries and ice 
pellets in some areas. I grumbled.. "Another washout"...

Then I got a call from local amateur astronomer Mike Wirths who said 
he currently had 90% clear skies at his place about 90km south-west 
of Ottawa. I had doubts, but decided to pack the car and head out to 
his place anyway. Quick glances out the windshield along the way 
revealed nothing but low clouds moving fairly quickly from the west. 
As I pulled my car beside his observatory near 10 PM EST, I noticed 
much to my delight that the sky was crystal clear and all full of 
stars! So I assembled my portable coffin, got my meteor gear together 
and setup on a flat field beside Mike's observatory. I scrambled to 
get the coffin assembled, and added on multiple layers of winter 
clothing as if an ice age was upon us. Setting up in the dark was 
somewhat frustrating as I kept fumbling and droping things all over 
the ground. Equally frustrating was not knowing how long the sucker 
hole would last and whether I was going through all this trouble for 
nothing. At least the wind died down completely and that alone made a 
big difference despite the freezing temperatures. I noticed one of 
Mike's cat jump in my car and get all comfortable into my meteor bag 
to try and warm up.

I signed-on just before 11:00 PM EST to try and catch some of the 
activity near the predicted 10:44 PM peak. Several spectacular 
earthgrazers appeared!! Even with the radiant only 3 degrees over the 
eastern horizon, it was obvious that some fairly high activity was in 
progress. It took only 16 minutes to see the first Leonid grazer. 
With the radiant just 3 degrees over the eastern horizon, the 2nd 
magn meteor shot some 40 degrees accross the zenith. Then 14 minutes 
later, a most impressive ORANGE coloured Leonid grazer of magn 0 
split the sky in half... it travelled 70 degrees!! However, the one 
that appeared at 11:55 PM blew me away... A multi-coloured magn -2 
Leonid grazer that shot 40 degrees. It went from vivid blue to green 
to yellow to orange before it extinguished and then a 3 sec train was 
left behind. This was definitely the most beautiful meteor of the 
night! Before stopping for a break at midnight, I saw 7 more Leonids 
and many of those were colourful and travelled long lengths. Although 
Leonids were the main attraction, I also monitored the minor showers 
such as Taurids and Alpha Monocerotids. A particularly nice South 
Taurid of magn -1 was seen moving down slowly in Orion. It did not 
have any train at all and appeared nearly pure white.

After this first successful hour, the sky was still 100% clear... so 
far so good! Took a break for 1/2 hour at midnight. I organized my 
gear more properly, fueled up on donuts and hot chocolate, and rested 
my voice from yelling "oooohhhh!!!" so much :) . It wasn't until I 
got out of my coffin that I realized how much frost there was 
already! Everything was dry and warm inside my coffin so this kind of 
wind shelter makes a big difference. After a quick peak through 
Mike's 18" scope, I noticed Leonid activity on the rise so I hurried 
back inside the coffin to resume observations. Mike and Attilla both 
went for a nap and would wake up to check out the predicted 2:51 EST 
peak. Despite the bright Quarter Moon, I could still see nearly 6th 
magnitude stars under transparent conditions. I had my field of view 
facing south and then to the west to avoid the Moon's glare.

The second hour (00:32-1:32 AM EST) had quickly increasing Leonids 
rates to near one per minute. Many meteors were coloured blue, yellow 
and orange. The brighter ones almost always left behind short lived 
trains. The highlight in this hour was a nice mag -3 orange Leonid 
low in the south-east.

The third hour (1:32-2:36 AM EST) began with 1 or 2 Leonids per 
minute. Most meteors were now on the faint side with an occasional 
bright one zipping by. Leonids began increasing quickly to 3 per 
minute shortly after 2:00 and I could feel my heart pounding faster. 
I also got my camera running and hopping some bright meteor would go 
in the frame. Sometimes a number of Leonids would appear within a 
very short time. At 2:02, I got 5 Leonids all within 10 seconds. 
Another burst at 2:11 had 4 Leonids within only 2 seconds! At this 
point, I felt we were getting close to a peak so I began yelling... 
"ATTILLA, LOOK UP!!!!!..(no answer).. ATTILLA!!!!???? ATT..." Then I 
remembered he was probably still napping inside the observatory's 
heated room and couldn't hear me yelling. Around 2:30, Leonids were 
coming down furiously at rates of 4 and sometimes 5 per minute. There 
were more instances of quick bursts of activity that had me screaming 
out their magnitudes into my tape recorder as fast as I could. At 
2:32, I had 6 Leonids all going different directions within 4 
seconds! Even more impressive was at 2:34 when 2 perfectly 
simultaneous Leonids appeared in parallel paths. I know how rare it 
is to see Leonids exactly at the same time because the're so fast and 
brief... but these two were definitely simultaneous. I think I 
screamed out my biggest "OOOHHHHHH!!!" of the night :)

My highest activity was seen in the 7 minutes period between 2:31 and 
2:38 with 32 Leonids. That comes up to an uncorrected hourly rate of 
272 meteors per hour! By the time Mike and Attilla came out to 
observe the shower at 2:45, activity was already beginning to drop. 
By 3:10, the rates were down to 2 meteors per minute and decreasing 
quickly. One Leonid was seen shooting right into the bright star 
Procyon! I continued observing until I was completely exhausted at 
5:30 (I had little sleep the previous night). As I got out of my 
coffin, I realized that everything was covered in a thick layer of 
white frost. Temperature read -7C, but it felt much warmer inside the 
coffin. Mike had left the observatory door open, so I could catch 
some sleep in a separate heated room with a couch. That felt really 
good. Thanks Mike!!

My grand total for the night is 486 meteors (442 Leonids, 8 north 
Taurids, 4 south Taurids, 3 Alpha Monocerotids and 29 sporadics). 
Total observing time (teff) is 5.90 hours.

Was this a fireball year? I don't think so, at least not for me. 
Although there was a good number of bright Leonids, fireballs were 
not really prominent. From a total of 442 Leonids, only 5 can be 
considered fireballs ( four magn -3 and one magn -4 ). Most meteors 
seen were in the magn +2 to +4 range. The average Leonid magnitude 
comes to +2.52. Ok, some of you did steal all the really big 
fireballs from me, right? :)

I would like to thank very much Mike Wirths for the invitation to 
setup at his observatory. It stayed perfectly clear all night!!! Had 
I gone to Casselman or one of the other local sites around Ottawa, I 
fear I might well have been staring at clouds instead. As soon as the 
Sun came up in the morning, clouds quickly moved in again. I still 
can't believe my luck!!!

Although this was nowhere near the storm activity of the 1999 Leonids 
I've seen in Spain, it was still a fabulous shower! I'll get my film 
processed soon and report if any meteors were caught.

Looking forward to the 2001 Leonids!!!!

Pierre Martin
Ottawa, Ontario










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