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RE: WHAT DO ALL THOSE CODES MEAN??? (was RE: (meteorobs) Five predictions for the Leonids - are those all?)
Lew Gramer, in too much haste to post, wrote the following:
>... the '4-rev'... supposed to cause the "European/African"
>meteor storm... was in 1866. Going a bit further back, the
>'7-rev'... was in 1799... when T-T dropped off the dust we
>hope will get North & South Americans excited on Nov. 19th!
Thanks to Bert M. for bringing to my attention the blunder-
fest which is the above-quoted paragraph! Lordy, lordy... :)
In fact, it is the '7-rev' which Earth will encounter FIRST,
and therefore this 7-rev dust trail will be responsible for
the predicted storm over Europe at 0400 UT on 19 Nov. (That
translates to 11pm EST on the 18th, or 12 midnight Atlantic
Time, for us lucky sots in New England & the Maritimes! :>)
What's worse, the '7-rev' trail was NOT ejected in 1799 by
the Mother of All Leonids (Comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle): rather,
the 7-rev trail was laid down (DOH!) 3 revolutions earlier
than the 4-rev trail of 1866 - or in other words, in 1767!
So of course, as we all now know, the dust trail which we
hope will give North America and the NE Pacific a storm at
1040 UT (5:40 EST), is in fact the 4-rev, ejected in 1866.
Finally, my apologies to fellow observers in South America
and sub-Saharan Africa: in fact, due to the short period of
the night when the Leonid radiant will be above your local
horizon, current predictions call for NEITHER Leonid storm
to be visible over the majority of these two Continents. :-(
Of course, that said, let me add this: our theorists are
getting better and better each year, but they can still be
quite WRONG. So for those who are not expected to be under
a storm this year, I advise you: PLEASE WATCH ANYWAY! You
may find yourself the only observer in a particular area,
who happens to observe the storm that REALLY happens. :)
PS: I chose to abuse my prerogative as Webmaster and List
admin, to correct my mistakes above, in the Web archive...
(Well, I actually did it just in case someone came upon my
post with a Web search, and was misinformed by it. ;>)
Clear skies all!
Lew
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