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(meteorobs) Observation July 30/31 2002
Greetings,
Here's a short observing report for the evening of July 30/31 at the
Casselman site. On that occasion, I had the company of several other
observers who kept busy with scopes.
I recorded the activity for close to one hour until local midnight
(when the Moon came up). I got a total 8 meteors. Most were
sporadics but I caught one North Delta Aquarid and one antihelion (I
was plotting).
The highlight-of-the-night was a spectacular fireball of magnitude -6
at exactly 3:37 UT. It appeared near the border of Cassiopeia and
Andromeda, and produced almost 20 degrees of path. It was slow
moving, yellowish and brightened up gradually. It was well seen, and
gorgeous!! Bright enough to cast some shadows. It left a short wake
behind for 2 seconds. Plot confirmed it as being a sporadic.
Pierre Martin
Ottawa, Ontario
DATE: July 30/31 2002
BEGIN: 0250 UT (2250 EDT) END: 0352 UT (2352 EDT)
OBSERVER: Pierre Martin (MARPI)
LOCATION: Long: -75.063 West; Lat: 45.079 North Elevation: 50m
City & Province: Casselman, Ontario, CANADA
RECORDING METHOD: talking clock/tape recorder
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
OBSERVED SHOWERS:_______________________________________radiant position
ANT (antihelion source)_________________2116 -15
CAP (Alpha Capricornids)________________2024 -10
NDA (North Delta Aquarids)______________2140 -08
SDA (South Delta Aquarids)______________2232 -16
PAU (Pisces Austrinids)_________________2244 -30
PER (Perseids)__________________________0144 +54
napx (sporadics from the north apex)____0212 +28
SPO (random sporadics)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
OBSERVING PERIODS: 0 = none seen; / = shower not observed
PERIOD(UT)__FIELD____Teff__LM____SPO_CAP_NDA_SDA_PAU_PER_ANT_napx
0250-0352___2035+14__0.97__6.23__6___0___1___0___0___0___1___0 = 8
The first column (Period UT) refers to observing periods broken down
as close as possible to one hour of true observing, in Universal
Time. The second column (Field) is the area in in the sky where I
centered my field of view. The third column (TEFF) represents
effective observing time (corrected for breaks or any time I did not
spent looking at the sky). One hour = 1.00 teff. The fourth column
(LM) is the average naked eye limitimg magnitude, determined by
triangle star counts. All following columns indicate the number of
meteors for each shower observed.
------------------------
MAGNITUDE DISTRIBUTIONS:
SHOWER
SPO: -6(1) -5(0) -4(0) -3(0) -2(0) -1(0) 0(0) +1(0) +2(1) +3(2) +4(2)
ANT: -6(0) -5(0) -4(0) -3(0) -2(0) -1(0) 0(0) +1(0) +2(0) +3(0) +4(1)
NDA: -6(0) -5(0) -4(0) -3(0) -2(0) -1(0) 0(0) +1(0) +2(1) +3(0) +4(0)
Average magnitudes: Sporadics (+1.66), ANT (+4.0), NDA (+2.0),
Note: Magnitude scale is to determine the brightness of sky objects.
Magnitude -8 is comparable to a quarter moon, magnitude -4 with the
planet Venus, magnitude -1 with the brightest star Sirius, magnitude
+2 to +3 with most average naked eye stars and magnitude +6 to +7 are
the faintest stars the naked eye can see under typical dark
conditions. A meteor of at least magnitude -3 is considered a
fireball. The above table contains the magnitudes from all observed
meteors, and the average (last column) for showers.
------------------------
SKY OBSCURED:
None
Corresponding F value for this session is 1.00
------------------------
Dead time:
- 2.58 min used for plots.
- 1.5 min used for breaks.
TOTAL: 4.08 min.
------------------------
Breaks (UT): 0300 (30sec), 0330-0331
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