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Re: (meteorobs) Astronomy magazine's coverage of the 2001 Leonids

In a message dated 10/02/2001 4:10:25 PM Eastern Daylight Time, byen00@earthlinkdot net writes:

I would also like to point out that Robert McNaught pointed out TWO CONSECUTIVE
years, where S&T misquoted or misinterpreted Leonids predictions, for their
Leonids articles... which were authored by yourself [Joe Rao].

      Actually . . . regarding the above comment, I had immediately exchanged E-mails with Rob privately after the "misinterpretation" incident (it regarded the values of rE-rD and Delta o, which helps to determine the predicted ZHR for a given meteor trail).  The other incident was a result of some last-minute editing of which I had nothing to do with.

      I also want to say here that I have learned quite a bit about the dynamics of meteor prediction these past few years from Rob, David, Esko Lyytinen and others.  I will be the first to state that -- initially -- I was not a big advocate of the predictive powers of the dust trail theory.  I have since changed my viewpoint on that account.  I also would like to think that -- in light of my previous S&T articles -- that if Rob felt that if I purposely tried to misquote him or alter any of his calculations in any way, that he would not have gone out of his way to cooperate so splendidly with me in the production of my latest Leonid article that appears in the November 2001 S&T.   

      I have been a member of this list for four years now and most of you know me as someone who doesn't post observations and opinions very often.  Even when there were some unflattering things written here recently about my previous Leonid contributions in S&T I didn't post any response in my defense (though others did).  

      I spent a very long time debating with myself as to whether to post my comments regarding the Leonids coverage in the November Astronomy.  Suffices to say that my earlier post is very much out of character for me.  I have never been so harshly critical of any article before such a large audience.  To that end, Bob Yen was probably right.  None of us are perfect.  And yet, I knew that my comments probably would stir up a hornets-nest of controversy in some quarters and that -- now in retrospect -- it would have been better to simply remain silent on the matter.  I now wish that I did.

-- joe rao