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(meteorobs) July 28, 2003 Meteor Observations from California



I observed with Joseph Assmus this morning under lousy conditions. We viewed
from the Alpine viewpoint to take advantage of the clear southern horizon.
Being right beside the freeway, I had forgotten how noisy this spot was. It
was nearly impossible to hear each other due to all the traffic (mostly big
rig trucks at that hour). There was no marine layer this morning so the
lights of San Diego engulfed the western half of the sky. There was also
periodic high clouds which caused us to constantly shift our field of views
to avoid them. The session was delayed thirty minutes due to the high cloud
cover when we arrived. The meteors we did see were mostly on the faint side.
The Alpha Caps were an exception though, producing seven (mostly bright)
meteors during the first hour of viewing. The South Delta Aquarids produced
twenty meteors, none brighter than +2. Other than that, it was an
unremarkable session. For some reason the meteor rates fell by fifty percent
during the second hour as there were long gaps between meteors. This is also
noticeable in Joseph's data. Rates recovered somewhat during the last ninety
minutes of the session. The highlight of the session occurred at 0910 UT
(0210 PDT) when a first magnitude meteor crawled out of the western sky
heading though Aquila and surrounding regions. It lasted a full three
seconds and fragmented at the end. The color of the meteoroid was blue green
to me with orange fragments. I also caught a -3 distinctly green fireball in
the northern sky while driving out to meet Joseph.

July 28, 2003

0730-0830 UT  1.00  6.19   7 CAP   1  PER   8 SDA   1 SIA  1  NPX
                                             8 SPO   26  TOTAL

0830-0930 UT  1.00  6.18   2 CAP   1  PER   4 SDA   1 SIA  0  NPX
                                             4 SPO   12 TOTAL

0930-1100 UT  1.50  6.05   0 CAP   3  PER   8 SDA   0 SIA  3  NPX
                                            11 SPO   25 TOTAL

TOTALS:          3.50  6.13   9 CAP   5  PER   20 SDA   2 SIA  4  NPX
                                             23 SPO   63 TOTAL


The first column gives the period watched stated in Universal Time (UT)
which is PDT + 7 hours. The second column gives the percent of that
particular hour actually spent observing the sky. The third column gives the
average limiting magnitude estimated during each period. The last several
columns list the activity seen during each period. I was facing east at an
altitude of 50 degrees during the entire session. No breaks were taken. CAP
= Alpha Capricornids, PER = Perseids, SDA = South Delta Aquarids, SIA
= South Iota Aquarids, NPX = Northern Apex, and SPO = Sporadics
 (random activity).

Location: Alpine Viewpoint: 116 39' W 32 49' N   Elevation = 900m

Bortle Scale Estimate: Class 5  (Suburban Sky)

Beginning Temperature/Relative Humidity: 65 F (18 C) 72%
Ending         "         "        "                        64 F (18 C) 68%

MAGNITUDES:

CAP:   0 (0) +1 (2) +2 (5) +3 (2) +4 (0) +5 (0) +6 (0)  AVE: +2.00
PER:    0 (0) +1 (0) +2 (2) +3 (2) +4 (1) +5 (0) +6 (0)  AVE: +2.80
SDA:   0 (0) +1 (0) +2 (4) +3 (7) +4 (7) +5 (2) +6 (0)  AVE: +3.35
SIA:     0 (0) +1 (0) +2 (0) +3 (1) +4 (1) +5 (0) +6 (0)  AVE: +3.50
NPX:   0 (1) +1 (0) +2 (1) +3 (0) +4 (2) +5 (0) +6 (0)  AVE: +2.50
SPO:  -1 (1)   0 (2) +1 (2) +2 (3) +3 (3) +4 (8) +5 (4)  AVE: +2.96

Bob Lunsford
San Diego, CA USA

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