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Re: (meteorobs) Meteors S FL USA, GRALE, 10/11 Aug 2001
> Lew,
> Are you serious? LM >7.5 and >7.0 in Moonlight??? Ok, maybe
> Long Key is a fine dark site, but I was observing 3km higher in the
> atmosphere than you were at one of the better spots in the world,
> and my best LM was 6.7, dropping to 6.2 in moonlight. Given a few
> tenths extra atmospheric absorption at your sea level location and
> higher humidity, that implies an equivalent LM~8.0 from Haleakala?
I'm not Lew, but I'd like to add my thoughts to this. Perhaps what's
missing here is a Bortle Class estimate. Remember, one man's LM 5.5 sky
can be another one's 6.3 (in our observing group the difference can amount
to almost a full magnitude between certain observers!). Do you regularly
see the Zodiacal band and the Gegenschein from Haleakala?
Also, Haleakala is 3000+m high. Perhaps oxygen deprivation is already
playing a role here. I remember a similar comment from Marco Langbroek -
when he observed from Mongolia in 1998 (Leonids) he couldn't get past LM
7.1, although the sky were perfectly dark (Marco correct me if I'm talking
nonsense here...). Also, perhaps Lew's experience as a deep-sky observer
has somehow 'altered' his response to faint stars?
>
> Yet your SPO counts, are not much higher than mine, especially if
> you include Apex in them? Seems like a significant disparity here
> between perception of meteors and fixed stars. Maybe getting a bit
> overenthusiastic after months under the bright orange skies of
> metro Boston??
Significant disparities between perception of meteors and fixed stars do
occur. Take Norman for example, he *routinely* sees LM 7.3 from his
location, yet his sporadic counts are relatively low regarding the LM.
As for getting overenthusiastic, I'm not speaking for Lew, but I think a
good meteor observer, no, any observer, should not be biased by such
elements. I hope I'm not wrong.
Clear skies and good LMs + high Spor counts! :)
Jure A.
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