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Re: (meteorobs) memorable meteors
I guess one meteor that stands out in my mind was a brilliant greenish
fireball that I observed swept from Cassiopeia to Cygnus on the peak night of
the Perseids in 1969. It was my first real "dazzler." I saw it from my
backyard in The Bronx . . . it was at least -10 magnitude. I was only 13
years old at the time, but seeing such a sight from my "urban observatory"
made a very deep and lasting impression on me. Later, in the October 1969
S&T, it was reported that a "Jan Finkelstein of Brooklyn, New York" saw a
spectacular greenish fireball of -10 magnitude at 12:59 a.m. on the morning
of August 12th. "My" meteor!
Then, about five or six years later, while attending City University,
somebody in the Earth and Planetary Science Department noticed that I had a
strong interest in astronomy and casually commented that, " . . . oh, you
ought to meet Jan Finkelstein." Shortly thereafter we did finally meet and
discussed the events of that August night in 1969: Two kids watching the
famous Perseid meteors; one in The Bronx, the other in Brooklyn.
Jan also took the cover shot of the May 25, 1975 total lunar eclipse for
the July 1975 S&T (trailed images of the eclipsed Moon in Scorpius). I've
since lost track of
him . . . but I think he changed his last name to Curtis and he now lives in
Alaska.
-- joe rao
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