----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, September 29, 2003 9:51
PM
Subject: (meteorobs) Re: High rates last
night?
Kim and All,
Some updated studies on the September
Perseids/Delta Aurigids have been included in the 2004 IMO Shower Calendar. It
states:
"A detailed,
fresh analysis of the low-activity, and little-studied, delta-Aurigids was
carried out by Audrius Dubietis and Rainer Arlt using IMO data from 1991-2001
in 2002. This demonstrated the shower probably represents a combination of two
separate, but possibly related, minor sources, the September Perseids, for
which the maximum time given above holds, and the delta-Aurigids, whose
activities and radiants effectively overlap one another. The showers are
probably not resolvable by visual watchers, who are advised to retain the,
slightly amended, shower parameters listed above. The actual delta-Aurigid
phase seems to give a weak maximum around sol = 181° (2004 September 23; ZHR
3, r= 2.5). "
Notice the second maximum coincides with
your observation of possible enhanced rates for the Delta Aurigid
stream.
Bob Lunsford
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2003
7:36 AM
Subject: (meteorobs) High rates last
night?
Early yesterday the forecast
for last night called for mostly clear skies here, so I made plans to
get two or three hours of observations in. I was out at my site
by 3:15 local time and saw two casual meteors before I could even sit back
in my lawn chair to get started. The sky was exceptionally clear and I
had counted LM's of 6.3 within twenty minutes. The truely astonishing
thing was the rates -- within the first thirty minutes of my watch I had
seen 12 meteors in addition to the two casual ones! That's a meteor
every 2.5 minutes, on average. Then, at around 3:53 am or so, the
stars started winking out and within two or three minutes the entire
sky was clouded out!!! What luck -- I felt like a kid being
kicked out of the candy store!
Interestingly, no fewer than
six of the meteors aligned with the DAU radiant, and at least two others
*possibly* aligned with the same radiant. The northern and southern
apex sources yielded three other meteors. Perhaps the possible DAU's
were also from the apex? I wouldn't have any other explanation and I
was beginning to worry about what to label these since DAU rates weren't
supposed to be high this late in their period. But alas, the clouds
took care of that dilemma! I didn't have enough TEFF for a full
period.
Maybe this was just a random
thirty minute "outburst" or maybe the apex region was just very active last
night. I'm not bothering with an actual report but if anyone wants my
data reduced I'd be glad to do it.
Kim
Youmans