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(meteorobs) Observation June 1/2 2003
Looks like my posts to meteorobs didn't go through the first time
around. Tying again...
- Pierre
Hi all,
Here's my observations from last week. On Sunday night June 1/2, I
went to Casselman to observe meteors for a couple of hours. There
were a lot of other observers with telescopes already there since the
sunset. I brought only my lawn chair to record meteors, to
scrutinize the radiants low in the south. Starting near midnight,
the skies were clear but hazy especially near all the horizons. Glow
from distant cities was brighter than usual. I also noticed some
considerable air glow, perhaps due to a modest aurora that was active
low in the northern sky. My limiting magnitude averaged only 6.16
for this session.
Despite the poor transparency, meteor activity was quite enjoyable
for an early June session with a total of 14 meteors seen. The first
hour produced a pair of antihelions meteors and one possible Omega
Scorpid that was seen far from the center of my field of view.
The second hour had no shower meteors, but the much larger numbers of
sporadics made up for it.
The highlight came at 12:38am EDT... A beautiful very slow moving
sporadic of 1st magnitude that crawled its way right beside Arcturus.
It had a distinct yellowish head and a short wake following behind.
When I signed-off, the auroras were beginning to get brighter to the
north, and displayed a strong greenish arc and a few spiked almost
halfway to Polaris.
Reports and plotting charts will be forwarded to NAMN...
Pierre Martin
Ottawa, Ontario
DATE: June 1/2 2003
BEGIN: 0347 UT (2347 EST) END: 0552 UT (0152 EST)
OBSERVER: Pierre Martin (MARPI)
LOCATION: Long: -75.063 West; Lat: 45.269 North Elevation: 50m
City & Province: Casselman, Ontario, CANADA
RECORDING METHOD: talking clock/tape recorder - cord align method
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
OBSERVED SHOWERS:_______________________________________radiant position
ANT (antihelion source - Sagittarids)__________1740 -23
OSC (Omega Scorpids)___________________________1540 -20
napx (sporadics from the north apex)___________2240 +08
sapx (sporadics from the south apex)___________2240 -22
SPO (random sporadics)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
OBSERVING PERIODS: 0 = none seen; / = shower not observed
PERIOD(UT)__FIELD____Teff__LM____SPO_ANT_OSC_napx_sapx
0347-0450__1625+14__1.01__6.15___3___2___1____/___/
0450-0552__1657+09__1.01__6.18___8___0___0____/___/
TOTALS:_____________2.02________11___2___1____/___/ = 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
______+0__+1__+2__+3__+4__+5_____AVE
SPO____1___0___2___5___2___1____+2.91
ANT____0___0___1___0___1___0____+3.0
OSC____0___0___0___1___0___0____+3.0
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 (FOV): None
Corresponding F value: 1.00 for this session.
------------------------
Dead time: 3.90 minutes
Breaks (UT): 3:50 (30sec), 4:07 (15sec), 4:36 (30sec), 5:21-22, 5:31 (20sec)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
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