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Meteor (Meteor, est. mag -2)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: naked eye Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: light
Time: Fri Oct 3 03:45:00 2003 UT Obs. no.: 886
On Thursday night, I observed a bright slow moving meteor while I was sitting on my deck. The meteor was aqua blue and it was about -2 magnitude. The meteor traveled across about 18 degrees from west to east. I used an alidade to measure how many degrees it traveled it traveled across the sky. This meteor was one of the slowest moving meteors I have ever seen.
Meteor (Meteor, est. to be in Leo)
Observer: Dave Mitsky (e-mail: djm28@psu.edu)
Instrument: 17-inch equatorial reflector Location: Lewistown , PA, USA
Light pollution: moderate Transparency: poor Seeing: fair
Time: Tue Nov 19 10:00:00 2002 UT Obs. no.: 723
After Tony Donnangelo and I decided that it was probably not worthwhile driving to anywhere else in Pennsylvania or New Jersey I eventually ended up watching the peak of the Leonids from the ASH Naylor Observatory near Lewisberry. During the 04:00 UT peak I observed for short time from a nearby park but could see only two stars in east and the moon due to cloud cover. There was a great lunar halo but I would have been much happier not to see one on this particular occasion. I fell asleep on my futon watching Letterman and was ready to crawl into bed when I looked out a window and saw that conditions had improved somewhat. I must admit that I debated with myself forsome time whether I should just call it quits and go to bed or travel the 18 miles to the observatory.When I arrived there was one ASH member there who had gone north to a dark site but returned when the weather didn't pan out. We were joined by two more members and a non-member by the time the Leonid peak was predicted. In the meantime I prepared the French Dome and trained the 17" f/15 classical Cassegrain on Jupiter (162 and 259x) and then Saturn (259x). The seeing was better than I expected with the high cirrus acting as a filter.At 10:00 UT I laid back in my lounge chair, covered myself with a sleeping bag, and began counting for the next hour. We were fortunate enough to have a hole surrounding the radiant more or less until dawn but conditions were far from ideal. My tally was 48 Leonids. These included several head-on meteors, three that left fairly good trains (one formed a neat arc momentarily), and one that was perhaps -3 magnitude. So while what we saw was far from a meteor storm it was certainly worth the drive and braving the lower than 30 degree Fahrenheit temperatures.Other highlights included an ISS pass at 10:10 UT, a moondog, and a very thin crescent Venus at 162x before closing up the dome. After that I used a pinhole lens in an unsuccessful attempt to see Venus as a crescent with my naked eye.
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: naked eye Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate Transparency: fair Seeing: fair
Time: Tue Oct 8 01:15:00 2002 UT Obs. no.: 691
Three of us observered the minor Draconid Meteor Shower. Most of the meteors were faint, but we did observe three bright meteors. The bright ones were very slow moving white meteors that left a brief smoke train. The bright ones were about -1 magnitude. We saw about ten meteors in about one hour. There was also a minor auroral outburst were we saw some faint red and green tones.
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: naked eye Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: none Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Mon Aug 12 01:00:00 2002 UT Obs. no.: 665
Last night 8 of us traveled to the northwest hills of Connecticut to view the perseid meteor shower. The seeing was great but the shower fell below our expectations. During the predawn hours, the peak reached about 20-25 meteors per hour, in a very dark observing spot. We did see a huge fireball explode. Our site really lit up when it happened.
Meteor (Meteor, est. mag -8)
Observer: Michael Amato (e-mail: abigmick@aol.com)
Instrument: naked eye Location: West Haven, Connecticut, United States
Light pollution: moderate Transparency: good Seeing: good
Time: Thu Aug 8 05:05:00 2002 UT Obs. no.: 664
Even though the Perseid meteor shower's peak is still days away, I still sat out to try to see some early meteors. At 1:05 AM, I saw a very bright meteor flash rapidly from north to south. I estimated its mag. to be 7 or 8th mag. Venus' 4th mag. was much fainter than the meteor. The meteor lasted about one or two seconds only. I'm going to try to see some more meteors tonight
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: John Callender (e-mail: jbc@west.net, web: http://www.west.net/~jbc/)
Instrument: naked eye Location: Carpinteria, CA, USA
Light pollution: light Transparency: poor Seeing: poor
Time: Sun Nov 18 11:14:00 2001 UT Obs. no.: 597
After the party my wife Linda threw to celebrate the publication of my book, we'd talked about staying up to see the Leonid meteor shower's California peak, predicted to occur between 1 and 3 a.m. local time, but it was overcast at 11:00 p.m., so the guests just headed home. But at 3:00, when I woke up to take our puppy outside for his nighttime potty run, the cloud cover was patchy enough to let some of the brightest stars and planets poke through, so I sat in the backyard for a few minutes gazing upward, and saw 6 bright meteors in the course of just a few minutes, one of them bright enough to leave a visible trail for a few seconds. For those at dark/clear sites it must have been impressive.
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: Dave Mitsky (e-mail: djm28@psu.edu)
Instrument: naked eye Location: Campsite 52 near New Germantown, PA, USA
Light pollution: none Transparency: good Seeing: excellent
Time: Sun Oct 21 06:30:00 2001 UT Obs. no.: 585
The Orionid meteor shower is not a major one with a ZHR of 10 to 20 per hour but it was a bit disappointing nevertheless this year. I dida count from a dark site, with a limiting magnitude of ~6.0 or better, at Little Knob in western Perry County on Sunday morning from 06:30 to 07:30 UT and got a grand total of 8 (3 through Gemini, 3 through Orion, and 2 through Taurus). I saw 16 meteors throughout the night, the brightest two being approximately first magnitude. One notable Orionid left a momentary train while another was a slow mover that traveled from Orion to the horizon and was a dull orange in color.Throughout the night I did some 8x42 binocular observing logging numerous few deep-sky objects including Collinder 65 and 399, Kemble's Cascade, M27, M31, M33-M39, M42, M81, M82, NGC 253, NGC 7000, and NGC 7789 and some tough ones such as M74 and NGC 7293 (the Helix Nebula).No hint of the possible aurora that was forecast was noted that night. However, on Sunday night (2001/10/22 UT) while doing a bit of double star observing at the ASH Naylor Observatory Ted Nichols II and I saw a dull ruddy glow near Polaris and perhaps the slightest hint of green below it at ~02:35 UT.There were clouds in the northern part of the sky and a light dome from the greater Harrisburg area so the auroral activity was rather difficult to discern.
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: Glenn Sackett (e-mail: gsackett@aol.com)
Instrument: naked eye Location: Honolulu, Hawaii, USA
Light pollution: severe Transparency: fair Seeing: excellent
Time: Fri Jan 7 06:48:00 2000 UT Obs. no.: 507
or was it space junk? Wondering if anyone else saw this extremely bright and long lasting event. Bright enough to see plainly from the very bright Waikiki tourist area and to see it "explode," apparently leaving a glowing green/whiteish cloud at the end of its trajectory. Lasted long enough for one group member to tell the rest of us about it, and for us to have the time to turn around to see it over our shoulders. It appeared to our east and tracked to the south.
Meteor (Meteor, est. mag >-13)
Observer: Dave Mitsky (e-mail: djm28@psu.edu, web: http://www.ezonline.com/ash/obs.htm)
Instrument: naked eye Location: Harrisburg, PA, USA
Light pollution: none Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Sat Sep 11 01:38:00 1999 UT Obs. no.: 476
On September 10th and 11th, 1999 my friend and compatriot Sandy Goodstein and I attended the Blackwater Falls Astronomy Weekend, which is held at a West Virginian state park that is striking in its natural beauty. The scenic vistas within the park are breathtaking, as are the namesake waterfalls. On Friday night a group of fellow observers from Pennsylvania drove southward from the Blackwater Falls Lodge to Spruce Knob, the highest mountain in the state. It took us a half hour to reach the top of the mountain from its base.The night sky was simply superb from the summit at 4863 feet, reaching a limiting magnitude in the upper sixth magnitude range. The summer Milky Way was extremely prominent and its dark lanes and rifts were easily seen. M13 and M33 were visible without optical aid. Telescopically deep sky objects of every variety were fantastic from this very dark site. Of the dozens of DSO's that I observed that night particularly memorable were the views of M8, M20, M24, M17, M31, M42, NGG 253, NGC 6888 (the Crescent Nebula), the Cygnus Loop (Veil Nebula complex), NGC 7000 (the North American Nebula), Barnard 86, and Barnard 142-143 (Barnard's E).We were to be joined later by a handful of amateurs from various east coast locales. All told the instruments working on the mountain top included a 16" Meade Starfinder Dob, a 15" Obsession Dob, two 12.5" ATM Dobs, my 12.5" Starsplitter Dob, Sandy's Celestron Ultima 8, a Celestron C5, my 80mm Orion ShortTube refractor, Sandy's 70mm Tele Vue Prontorefractor, and Sandy's 8x56 Celestron Ultima binocular.After about an hour of experiencing what John Denver called "almost heaven", observationally speaking, the whole landscape was suddenly brilliantly illuminated, far brighter than during full moon. Having experienced similar events three times previously over the years, but never in such a spectacular fashion, I wasted no time in jerking my head upward to try to catch the fireball that was providing the light show. This time I not disappointed. Near the zenith I beheld the most brilliant meteor I have ever seen. I noticed no color, saw no train, and heard nosound but some people who saw this brighter than -13 magnitude beauty from the star party at the Blackwater Falls nature center did report the fireball as being green.Later in the night I observed a shadow transit of Io through my 12.5" Starsplitter Dob and Sandy's Ultima 8. The seeing was surprisingly steady and the level of detail seen in Jupiter and Saturn through a variety of instruments was excellent. I used my 8mm Radian (191x) and a 4mm Radian (381x) that I borrowed from one of our group. The 4mm produced 508x in the Ultima 8 but the image, while somewhat soft, was still acceptable. One of the latecomers was a cometary observer and as soon as C/1999 H1 (Lee) rose high enough in the east he began studying it with his 12.5" Dob. Comet Lee was also readily visible through Sandy's 70mm Pronto.Using my ShortTube 80 piggybacked on Sandy's SCT I took prime focus astrophotographs of Collinder 399 (the Coathanger), the Double Cluster, M45, and M42. All too soon the constellations of winter made their debut and marched towards the meridian. As dawn neared, the zodiacal light arced high in the east, followed by a blazing Venus. Soon we began our slow descent from the summit of Spruce Knob, thus ending a truly wonderful night of amateur astronomy.
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: Dave Mitsky (e-mail: djm28@psu.edu)
Instrument: naked eye Location: Harrisburg, PA, USA
Light pollution: moderate Transparency: good Seeing: good
Time: Mon Dec 14 05:45:00 1998 UT Obs. no.: 432Because of cloudy weather on the night of 12/13 I did not travel to a dark site to watch the shower. Instead I viewed the event from a nearby park after the skies cleared. I started my Geminid count at approximately 12:45 a.m. (05:45 UT) and ended at 01:35 a.m. (06:35 UT) when it became increasingly cloudy. At least 22 Geminids were observed in that period, most of them very fast. Six were between 0 and -1 magnitude in brilliance. I counted 10 that were less than zero but brighter than second magnitude and 6 that were less than second magnitude. Most of the meteors traveled westward or in a southwesterly direction. No color was seen in any of the Geminids.
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: Dave Mitsky (e-mail: djm28@psu.edu)
Instrument: naked eye Location: Harrisburg, PA, USA
Light pollution: light Transparency: good Seeing: good
Time: Wed Nov 18 06:00:00 1998 UT Obs. no.: 419I counted 22 Leonids and 5 sporadics from ~6:00 to 9:00 UT (about 2.5 hours of observing time excluding breaks). One fireball was -4 or -5 magnitude, turned yellow and then green, and left a persistent train. Two others reached approximately -2 magnitude.
Meteor (Meteor)
Observer: Mike Pierce (e-mail: xtozaj@webtv.net)
Instrument: naked eye Location: Malone, Florida, USA
Light pollution: light Transparency: excellent Seeing: excellent
Time: Tue Nov 17 05:30:00 1998 UT Obs. no.: 420Tonight, we prepared for the meteor shower which, unfortunately, was a big disappointment. Spotted an avg. of 12 per hour, mostly extremely short-lived and with very little residuals. However, we did spot one which streaked yellow and then green and left an obvious smoke train. Maybe next year. Still got some great obs. of Orion and the Trapezium through my scope and binos.
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