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(meteorobs) Observation May 2/3 2003
Hi all,
Apologies for posting this meteor report so late (I've been a little
swamped with various things this month)...
After a lousy and cold winter, earlier this month I finally had my
first useful meteor session since last December's Geminids. During
the first weekend of May, I was attending a dark sky star party
(called Frozen Banana) out west of Ottawa to try out my new 14.5"
dobsonian. The weekend had crystal clear skies, so a perfect chance
also to just sit back and enjoy some long-overdue meteors.
After spending most of the night with the deep sky enjoying
spectacular views of galaxies, nebulae and clusters, I settled in my
lawn chair at 2:30am EDT local time to start watching for early Eta
Aquarids. Despite a decent dark sky, no ETAs at all were seen. The
first hour had decent sporadics rates with 10 seen, but really not
much in terms of shower activity.
A lot of faint meteors. The only one that stood out well was a mag
-1 sporadic in the western sky.
I signed off at 4:30am EDT, being a little weary and cool but pleased
to have seen some meteors!
Complete details in the standard NAMN report below...
Pierre Martin
Ottawa, Ontario
DATE: May 2/3 2003
BEGIN: 0630 UT (0230 EST) END: 0830 UT (0430 EST)
OBSERVER: Pierre Martin (MARPI)
LOCATION: Long: -79.368 West; Lat: 46.081 North Elevation: 50m
City & Province: Powassan, Ontario, CANADA
RECORDING METHOD: talking clock/tape recorder - cord align method
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
OBSERVED SHOWERS:_______________________________________radiant position
ANT (antihelion source - Sagittarids)__________1552 -20
ETA (Eta Aquarids)_____________________________2232 -01
napx (sporadics from the north apex)___________2052 -01
sapx (sporadics from the south apex)___________2052 -31
SPO (random sporadics)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
OBSERVING PERIODS: 0 = none seen; / = shower not observed
PERIOD(UT)__FIELD____Teff__LM____SPO_ANT_ETA_napx_sapx
0630-0730___1823+21__0.98__6.50__10___0___0____0___0
0730-0830___1928+24__0.88__6.38___3___0___0____1___0
TOTALS:______________1.86________13___0___0____1___0 = 14
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
______-1__+0__+1__+2__+3__+4__+5_____AVE
SPO____1___0___1___1___2___6___3____+3.35
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 (FOV): None
Corresponding F value: 1.00 for this session.
------------------------
Dead time: 1.16 minutes used for plots. 7 minutes for break.
Breaks (UT): 8:00-07
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