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(meteorobs) Excerpt from Sky & Telescope News Bulletin - November 23, 2001
Often reposted, but here is the Leonid report from S&T in its entirety.
One short personal note: I observed Comet LINEAR (C/2000 WM1) during my
stay at Xinglong Station in China. On the night of 18/19 Nov 2001, the
comet was readily visible naked eye with averted vision, appearing to my
naked eye as actually BRIGHTER than the not-too-distant M33... No scope
or binocular magnitude estimates were attempted - I was a bit busy prepar-
ing for a meteor storm at the time ;> - but LINEAR clearly seemed brighter
than the then-predicted magnitude in the mid-7s. Fellow meteor observer
Meng Huan, also at Xinglong that night, concured with this assessment.
(Did you submit your binocular observation to encke.jpl.nasadot gov, Huan?)
Clear skies,
Lew Gramer
------- Forwarded Message
Subject: Sky & Telescope News Bulletin - November 23, 2001
------------------
LEONID METEORS ROAR IN ON SCHEDULE
The best meteor shower in 35 years sent bright shooting stars streaking
through the sky before dawn Sunday morning for observers throughout the
Americas, the Pacific, and the Far East. Preliminary reports paint a
picture of the much-anticipated 2001 Leonid shower matching predictions
fairly closely. However, the observed rates of a couple of thousand per
hour (as seen by a single observer) fell shy of the most optimistic
predictions of between 7,000 and 15,000 per hour.
In eastern North America, skywatchers under dark skies before dawn counted
several hundred meteors per hour -- an average of one every 5 or 10
seconds, with occasional spectacular bursts (presumably by chance) of two
or three at once. A crowd of SKY & TELESCOPE staffers at a lakeshore in
western Massachusetts (under a 6th-magnitude sky) oohed and aahed at blue,
green, and red fireballs radiating from the cutting edge of the Sickle of
Leo, occasionally lighting the ground with flashes like distant heat
lightning. The peak for North America was predicted to arrive around 10:00
Universal Time (shortly before dawn in the East), but rates seemed still to
be increasing as morning brightened the sky.
Indeed, observers farther west reported an even more spectacular show a
little later. In Kentucky, David Phillips described seeing roughly a meteor
per second under an extremely dark sky. Much of the Midwest was cloudy, but
Westerners apparently had the best of it. The peak probably came around
11:00 UT, according to Joe Rao, observing with a crowd of 60 at the
Skywatcher's Inn in Arizona. "It was partly cloudy here, with 30 to 70
percent sky obstruction, but you couldn't look up for more than a second or
two without seeing a meteor, sometimes four at once," said Rao. "These were
1st and 2nd magnitude. It was the most amazing shower I've seen in over 35
years of watching the sky."
Observing from Fremont Peak, California, Landon Curt Noll observed several
bursts of activity including a count of more than 1,500 meteors during a
1-hour interval beginning at 10:45 UT, with more than 600 of those appeared
in the 15 minutes beginning at 11:00.
Rates seemed to decline somewhat after about 11:15 UT, but farther west in
Hawaii, Stephen J. O'Meara and P. K. Chen were more than satisfied as the
radiant rose high in the sky from about 12:00 to 16:00 UT. "We had an
absolutely stunning, remarkable, brilliant and continuous display of
Leonids," writes O'Meara. "The best activity I have ever seen. Though there
was no 'storm' -- meaning the sky was not filled with meteors falling down
like rain -- the shower did rain meteors and fireballs for four hours."
The biggest peak was predicted to arrive around 18:00 UT, when Australia
and the Far East would be turned into view. Rates did surge again around
this time, but judging from early reports, this second peak was only
comparable to the first. According to early reports from the International
Meteor Organization, "The strongest peak observed [was] around 18:20 UT....
The rates during this peak reached more then 2800 meteors per hour."
Observing from Alice Springs, Australia, Bradley Schaefer reported a
personal meteor count that peaked with 660 meteors seen during a 15-minute
interval. "They were fast," he writes, "and the bright ones were visible in
various colors, primarily red, green, and yellow."
[...]
COMET LINEAR NEARS NAKED-EYE BRIGHTNESS
Observers report that Comet LINEAR (C/2000 WM1) has brightened to about
magnitude 6.5. Its brightening has followed predictions rather well, and if
it follows through, the comet should just reach naked-eye visibility over
the next week. Some observers already report being able to glimpse it
unaided. This coming week, the comet dives farther south as it moves
through Aries and enters Pisces. For observers at midnorthern latitudes,
Comet LINEAR is well up in the east after dusk. The comet remains up all
night at the beginning of the week, but will set at about 2 a.m. local time
by the end of the month. It lies due south at around 9:30 p.m. Here are
positions for the coming week in 2000.0 coordinates:
R.A. Dec.
Nov 24 2h 31m +26.5 deg.
26 2h 15m +21.2
28 1h 59m +15.1
30 1h 42m + 8.5
[...]
More celestial events, sky maps, observing projects, and news of the
world's astronomy research appear each month in SKY & TELESCOPE, the
essential magazine of astronomy. See our enormous Web site and astronomy
bookstore at http://www.skypub.com/ . Clear skies!
SKY & TELESCOPE, 49 Bay State Rd., Cambridge, MA 02138 * 617-864-7360
=============================================================================
Copyright 2001 Sky Publishing Corporation. S&T's Weekly News Bulletin and
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