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Re: (meteorobs) Strange Leonid...
on 11/25/01 3:00 PM, Pierre Martin at p.martin@cyberusdot ca wrote:
> Did anybody see this anomalous Leonid? It appears like the meteor
> split in two pieces about halfway on its path. It's the first time I
> see something like that on a high-velocity meteor...
>
> http://www.spaceweather.com/meteors/images/18nov01_page4/Andreassen2.jpg
This photo is even odder than you think: the Leonid doesn't split into two,
it's two meteors merging into one (!) Seriously, if you recognize the star
field, that's the handle of Ursa Major at the right edge, and the head of
Draco at the upper left. It's a Leonid all right -- backtrack it from Ursa
Major and it hits the radiant neatly. The meteor starts near zeta UMa and
passes directly over nu Dra. So, we are definitely not talking about an odd
meteor -- we're talking about an odd camera.
I must confess that I am hard put to proffer a convincing explanation. We
can't attribute it to a bump to the camera because the divergence ends
during the frame, and ends quite suddenly. My best guess -- and it's pretty
bad -- is that the photographer passed a pane of glass across the field of
view from left to right. The meteor was initially seen through the glass,
which split the image into two components and absorbed some of the light.
Then the meteor passed beyond the forward edge of the glass and was seen
normally. This wild hypothesis is supported by the two tracks, the obvious
absorption of light on the split side, and the fact that one of the two
tracks is clearly much greener than the other. What argues against it is the
convergence point, which should be discontinuous if this hypothesis be
correct.
This is actually a fascinating problem. How DID he get that shot? I'm
convinced it's an optical effect at the camera, but exactly what?
Chris
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