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(meteorobs) Spectacular meteor last night
Yesterday (December 10, 2002 @ 22:45:15 UT) I observed a spectacular meteor while standing on my balcony. I live in Almelo, The Netherlands (52 20 N, 6 38 E).
I was examining the LM field in Gemini, the 5.3 star was visible and I was trying to see the star to the right of Iota.
Then the meteor appeared near the head of Hydra, approximately at RA 8h45m Dec 9, corresponding to altitude 23 azimuth 105 at the time. The meteor remained visible for at least 4 seconds, probably 5. It dissapeared near Ursa Major, RA 10h00m, Dec 40. This was about 35 degrees above the horizon, azimuth 70. It was moving slow.
When I first saw it, it had a short tail. The magnitude during this phase was about 0. The meteor dimmed a little (mag 1) and the tail disappeared. But now there were some flares, up to -1 at least. After the last flare there was some fragmentation. About 8 bits were visible for less than one second. They trailed the meteor, but they kept moving in the same direction. They drifted away from the meteorpath a little though. The magnitude of the fragments was about 2.
The meteor continued for a while, at magnitude 0/1.
When I first saw it, it seemed white/green. The tail also had this color, after the tail disappeared the meteor seemed white.
The meteor did line up nicely with the Sigma Hydrid radiant, but it was only 5 degrees away when I first saw it and it was visible for some 36 degrees.
I have considered fireworks, since december is fireworks month, but because of the constant speed and the near horizontal trajectory I don't think I saw fireworks. It might have been space junk though.
Daniel
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