Last Night's Meteor Action

[martinastro]

Well it actually cleared up last so I did a regular meteor watch from 00.30 - 03.10 BST. At first, clear gaps formed then they grew in size until the sky was largely clear. The earlier showers were a blessing because they cleaned the atmosphere up producing a stunning crisp trans sky with a very dark background. The sky was very dark, even street lights near me. I wasn't doing a count and I wasn't recording times, this was just a relaxed session to gauge the sky. I was on the phone with John McConnell at the time (who was clear also) and together we observed the sky catching quite a few meteors. The Milky Way was very impressive!!, we both agreed that its intensity was like that of a long cloud. The NAN was easy, coathanger, M31 etc. Later from a country location I took well over 100 images. Several passed through my patrol area but were too faint for the camera to detect. By the end of the session, when the sky became overcast again I had seen fantastic activity. The highlights were a Perseid fireball around 02.00 at mag -5 (at least) which crossed the Perseus border into Triangulum with a gorgeous tail and a stunning emerald green diamond head of large diameter. It experienced a bright double flash and brightly illuminated the surrounding patches of altocumulus which were drifting by. It was a beauty!. No sonic boom was heard. Another fireball was seen before dawn through an overcast sky, a Perseid, moving at tremendous speed to the S. It lit the cloud deck up from behind. Magnitude unknown. I will be doing another watch tonight. Here's a patrol image.

[Paul]

Sounds like you had a good night Martin! It bucketed down with rain pretty much continuously here as it continues to do so on and off now - just an hour or so of sunshine this morning. Tonight is scheduled to have some clarity though!

[Keith g]

Ditto Martin ! I to managed some precious time out last night, I counted at least 25 lightning bolts from the storm that had passed over earlier in the evening.

It was such a good sight to actually see the stars again after some time, last night it had cleared up for over an hour, and I managed to see about 10 perseid meteors , a lot of which were bright, fast, and had left bright trails lasting for a couple of seconds, so it seems to be building up nicely. I observed from 23:30 to 01:00am.
 
I also noticed that there was a lot of activity coming form a source in the constellation Aquarius last night with regard to meteors also. Although they were in gemeral fainter that the perseids, I counted another 10 coming from a point in the southeast over the course of the hour.
 
Was this expected, or was it unusual?? Did you notice these meteors?
 
Keith..

[martinastro]

Thanks Paul, pity you had the clouds but hopefully things will be different tonight. Some disagreement with the forecasts. Met O giving clear spells, RTE going for cloud and rain moving in. I plan on doing quite a serious session tonight if the sky will be kind with me. Weather is looking really dodgy for maximum, it will depend on the timing of those fronts. I hope to get some clear spells, if not on the 11/12th, then 12/13th. Good luck tonight Paul, and keep an eye out for Perseid earthgrazers after sunset. 

Keith, great to hear from you, nice to know you where out watching the activity last night to. The fainter enhanced activity could have been from the Alpha Capricornid shower which is active at the moment. These can be rich and bright at times. I didn't notice any from that region last night because for the first half of the session my E, SE, was blocked by obstructions. I recall the Perseids last year when the greatest numbers before dawn seemed to burn up in Aquarius, Cetus and Ursa Major. This is where I will be shooting over the next few nights.

I'm VERY jealous you saw lightning last night. I would love to have seen that. Forecaster Tony Gilbert would be  glad of the report. I heard there was good t-storms and severe flooding in the Dublin area.

Good luck tonight Keith and I hope you catch us one on camera!

[brianb]

Sounds like you had a good night Martin!

Yeah, where's the "green with envy" emoticon?

I was just about to give up at 1am (BST) when I noticed a substantial clearance with good conditions over about 1/4 of the sky. By the time I'd set up the hole had largely closed with thinnish stratocumulus. Managed to get a few VS obs in small holes in the SC, rarely amounting to 1/8 clear, though there was a 10 min period when the sky was about half clear around 2:15 (BST). After this "main clearance" the conditions worsened & I gave up altogether at 3:30.

As Martin says the transparency in the gaps was very good. If the gaps had stayed in the same place it would have been a lot less frustrating - as it was, every time I pointed at a target, a cloud formed in a direct line. The seeing was absolutely appalling, too, I had a quick look at Jupiter when it appeared in a hole early in the session and the seeing was so poor the Moons looked huge and there was no trace of detail on the disk at all. I couldn't use a power greater than x100 on stars even near the zenith as the seeing was smearing them out. If it had been hazy or Moony it would have been a complete dead loss and I'd probably have been able to sleep with a clear conscience.

About half a dozen meteors seen, all apparently Perseids, none spectacularly bright. If I'd been intent only on wide field imaging for meteors I might have got one or two 2 min exposures during the whole night.

[martinastro]

Keith, check out this link, there is activity from Aquarus. I must watch out for these.

http://www.popastro.com/sections/meteor/meteor-aug2007.htm

Brian, good report, you were up late. I had the same prob with a patch of cloud hanging over Boattini. Fingers crossed for tonight.

[Steveo74]

Fantastic shot Martin, love the Milky Way showing through...   Great report... 

[Roman White]

I also had an observing session on Aug.09/10, 23-01 UT. Total ZHR was 20...25. Pretty much Perseids, also were present some meteors from Cassiopeids and from the S direction (it is hard to define what was the exact source - d-Aquarids, Capricornids or Antihelion)
Much better activity on Aug.11/12 and especially on Aug.12/13.

Here's a small report:
Date    UT       ZHR estimate             Meteors completely recorded (time, brightness, colour, trail on a skychart)
09/10  23-01  20...25                          8
11/12  22-01  30...45                          12
12/13  21-00  60...90 (peaked 120)        42

Martin, is that a meteor on your photo (faint vertical line in the center)? What constellation is on that image?

P.S. I have seen the Perseids "live ZHR profile" today on the IMO website, and I'm delighted to see that my estimates are very close.

[brianb]

is that a meteor on your photo (faint vertical line in the center)? What constellation is on that image?

Could easily be a satellite.

I see Cygnus central, Lyra to the centre right and the "coathanger" at the bottom just right of centre.

[martinastro]

That's a good report Roman, your visual observations confirm the high rates on maxmium 

Great work documenting the other activity from the lesser showers!

I'm not sure what the line is on the image. I didn't notice anything there at the time and since I rarely move my eye away from a patrol area for anymore than a few seconds I would guess it was a meteor, although as Brian said, it could be a sat to. With that length of a trail I'm sure I would have seen it at the time.