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Leonid Meteor Shower 2002
Jacer writes "Adler press reports that 'approximately every 33 years the Leonid Meteor shower becomes a breathtaking meteor storm -- capable of illuminating the night sky with thousands of meteors per hour. Astronomers predict that the height of the storm over North America in 2002 could possibly generate 40 meteors every minute -- over 2,400 per hour!' Space.com has plenty of information available. I wanted to submit it early so you could plan ahead. It'd make for a long work or school day, but it's not something I'd care to miss."
where's my wishlist...
is the peak. A little detail that would have been better in the introductory text.
A. Rightmann
And damn, I'm pretty sharp to have caught this, since I'm pushing 90 now...
ha ha, i still remember how last year was going to be this great meteor shower, and it was going to be the biggest one in a hundred years.
so me, being a sucker, sat outside in the mountains and froze my can off waiting for the sky to light up like it was US vs. Iraq and got jack
well, it wasn't exactly jack, but it certainly wasn't like daylight. however i will say that it was still one of the coolest things i've ever seen, and by all accounts it was a minor one. if you have the chance i highly recommend watching these. if nothing else it's a nice quiet hour or two to appreciate that some of the best things in life have nothing to do with technology.
Look Skyward November 19 In The Early Morning Hours To Catch The Leonid Meteor Shower.
And just what! am I going to use to catch a Leonid meteor? and if I do, can I sell it on EBay without NASA busting me for selling a piece of space rock that they say belongs to them?
From excellent karma to terible karma with a single +5 funny post...
I have always wanted to watch the Leonid Meteor Shower, but unfortunately I live in Cleveland where we have two types of weather. Cloudy, and Cloudy with Rain.
I'm a Tasty-vore. If it's Tasty, I'll eat it.
I'd hate to end up missing something like this and instead be out having meaningless sex...
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
Last year I went camping out in the Arizona desert to watch these. I'll be going back there again this year as well.
Something I discovered last year... if you plan on doing any time exposure photography, don't leave the shutter open for as long as you normally would for a night sky photo. I ended up with a lot of fogged prints because of the high occurence of super-bright meteoroids. You know the ones I mean, the kind you can almost read by, the ones that leave fluorescing smoke trails that seem to linger for five or ten seconds.
And too bad I get drug screened where I work, it could've been a "wow - bitchin'" night.
The Leonids happen every year, but on some years, they're brighter and fall at a greater frequency. It all depends on exactly how Earth passes through the Leonid stream from Comet Temple-Tuttle, which passes near our orbit every 33 years. However, even if the comet isn't there, its dust trails from previous orbits still are, and the big Leonid years are the years when we'll be passing through a more recent trail. Last year was supposed to be a Big Year because we passed through 2 dust trails. If this year is anything at all like last year, it should be a heck of a sight...
Now, if only there weren't that pesky nearly-full moon at the same time.
Keep in mind this is two days before the full moon, so you're going to miss a lot of low magnitude meteors.
-aiabx
Just this guy, you know?
Oh, and fucking. Lots and lots of fucking.
Obviously, you are not part of the core \ . demographic.
Oh boo hoo. I went to see last year's meteor shower and I'm up in northern Canada, we just brought lots of hot chocolate and we were fine, eh. Then one of the meteorites came flying down and landed in the field, it was still hot so we put some grass and wood on it and a huge bonfire to keep warm eh. Then the aliens came down and wanted their rock back so we had to give it to them, but they let us go without a probing, which was nice. Come to think of it, I think our hot chocolate's may have been a wee bit Irish. I like stories. Don't you like stories?
-hero.
You'll be blinded, which will make you easy pickin's for the man-eating plants that will have sprouted by next morning. I mean, geez, doesn't anyone else here watch science documentaries?
Roving Web-Teleoperated Robot
This year's Leonid shower will be the last one for a long time to come! Earth won't pass through this comet trail for quite a while. The next probable year for a Leonid shower/storm is 2098, or maybe even 2131!
See this article for explanation. The dates are on page 4.
But for this year, a great show is still expected. So if you have half an option to go outside for a while (say, Nov 19), do so!
I believe posters are recognized by their sig. So I made one.
Before modding this off-topic, read the whole post:
Quick, any fans of Cormac McCarthy out there?
What book of his set in the 19th century prominently features the Leonids in the first few paragraphs?
Answer: Blood Meridian.
Quite possibly the best American novel written in the second half of the 20th century. It's about a band of American mercenaries who go into Mexico to hunt up scalps for pay.
(It's also one of the eeriest and most violent American novels written -- heads getting lopped off, horses getting slaughtered, and a very weird, Ahab-like character called 'The Judge' presiding over everything.)
Anyway, the main character -- the Kid -- is born beneath the Leonids, and the infrequent meteor shower during the night of The Kid's birth makes for a very strange sense of forboding. That, and the fact that the Leonids come every 33 years -- very Christ-like, I suppose -- so the kid gets marked with this odd mixture of innocence, wisdom, and violence.
So I had no idea what the Leonids were, and after reading Blood Meridian, I thought it was something McCarthy made up. But a little research, of course, proved otherwise.
The strange thing about the Leonids -- and about the cycle of Halley's (sp?) comet (Mark Twain was born when the comet appeared, died when the comet next appeared) -- makes for some interesting moments in American literature.
My question -- finally get back on topic -- is this: when all these meteors are shooting through the sky, do they burn up in the atmosphere? Do some make it through? You'd think if there were that many, one or two would cause some serious damage.
Seriously though, I know I plan on attempting to take some pictures this year, and hopefully something will turn out. For those of you complaining about a full moon, the moon doesn't rise until late in the night, which should give plenty of good photography time, particularly for those of us on the west coast.
If anyone else is interested in this sort of thing but isn't sure how to get started or what you need, this very good beginner's guide makes for good reading.
Random and weird software I've written.
A couple of tips for the first timers.
- Get away from the city lights (and pullotion) as much as possible.
- Have a good field of view because they will be all over the sky not just in the vicinity of Leo
- Do NOT concentrate at the spot where they will come from (Leo) rather about 40 degrees away, as odd as this may seem, the shooting stars around Leo won't leave a long trail (they will be coming towards you ) and you won't be seing much.
As the comet Tempel-Tuttle approaches the Sun toward a May 2031 perihelion, it will pass within 1.5 a.u. of Jupiter in August 2029. This encounter will push the comet closer to the Sun and increase the distance between Earth's orbit and the comet's to 0.0162 a.u. -- their largest separation since 1733. Such a large gulf between the two orbits may preclude any substantial meteor activity for the year 2031, and for several years thereafter, when the next cycle of Leonid storms would normally be expected.
In examining this next Leonid cycle, McNaught has found three outlying dust trails that the Earth will approach in the years 2033 and 2034. "Unfortunately," he notes, "they are probably too distant for any reasonable chance of high activity."
There will be little improvement at the comet's subsequent return in 2065, for the separation between the orbits of the comet and the Earth will have diminished only slightly to 0.0146 a.u.
In 2098 the separation of the orbits shrinks to 0.0062 a.u. And in 2131, for the first time since 1633, the comet crosses our orbital plane slightly outside the Earth's orbit at a distance of 0.0089 a.u. Not until one, or both, of these remote years can our great grandchildren expect to witness a storm of Leonid meteors.
So get out there and see the damn thing. I'm in Northern Thailand, so not much hope for me :-(
If you are going outside don't forget these essentials:
;)
-a blanket you don't mind getting mud/grass on
-a Deet based bug repellent (Unscented Off in the push spray works great)
-a small flashlight (so you don't ruin your night vision)
-take your Allegra _before_ you leave
-pants/long sleeves if you're bothered by bugs
And I would recommend:
-pillows
-snacks (Thermos w/ Hot Chocolate/Coffee, food you can eat with gloves on)
-spare jacket, sweater, gloves (layers!)
-wine
-small radio (I prefer a short-wave; in the middle of no where you can usually pick up different stations)
-a date
-xtra blankets to 'cuddle' in
Great occasions do not make heroes or cowards; they simply unveil them to the eyes. -Bishop Westcott
The almost full moon will really impact this show... it will be best to wait until very early morning - 4am on the US east coast when the Moon is about to set, but before morning twilight starts to brighten the sky. Put something - like trees - between you and moon.
If you are out while the moon is up, you will learn just how bright the moon really is when you are away from city lights. After 20 minutes, you won't need a flashlight. Be sure to notice how you can't detect color very well.
While the moon is up, you will only see the brightest of the meteors, so don't expect anything like last year. Just hope and pray for a storm during the narrow moon set/twilight window.
..except for the nearly full Moon. However, during the 'peak' Leonid period (3:30am - until daybreak) there are a number of other fine sights in the sky, many observable with good binoculars or a medium-size telescope:
1. Saturn's upper pole is currently pointed in our direction, which means you can see more of the rings right now than we will for many years to come.
2. Jupiter will also be high enough in the sky for a good view. The Galilean moons are breathtaking. On November 18th, viewers in the northern hemisphere will be able to see Ganymede occult Io for about 3 minutes - this kind of event is only possible to view from earth once every six years or so!
3. The Pleiades, also known as 'Subaru' or 'Seven Sisters', among other names. Very young, bright stars forming from gas disturbed in a supernova. With moderately powered binocs or a small telescope, one can see that the 'seven sisters' are just the brightest of hundreds of stars in an open cluster. An extended-exposure astrophotograph will show the clouds of bluish gas and dust still surrounding the stars.
4. My favorite - Orion, and the Great Orion Nebula. For viewers in the mid-northern latitudes, look for 3 stars in a straight diagonal line, almost due south at 3:00 am and about 2/3 elevated from the horizon to the zenith. Below those three stars (Orion's Belt) you should be able to find two dimmer stars in a vertical line (Orion's Sword) with a fuzzy patch in between (in darker areas). Good binoculars or a small scope will show one of the most beautiful sights in the sky!
So even if the Leonids crap out, there will still be things to see! Get that old telescope out and see what you can find!
Everyone will start to cheer when you put on your sailin' shoes.