Southern Delta Aquariid Meteor Shower 29-31 July, 2016

[Bendy (Ben)]

Anyone planning to check out this meteor shower tonight??

Ian Musgrave provides a nice overview of it over at his blog:

http://astroblogger.blogspot.com.au

We're enduring a cold front over here in the south west at the moment. Hoping that the clouds will part after 12pm tonight!

[gaseous (Patrick)]

I sat up for a few hours last night specifically to check this out - talk about a major letdown! Peak activity was supposed to be 15-20 per hour, so I was expecting one every 3-4 minutes, but saw maybe 2 over a 2 hour period. Admittedly I wasn't glued to the eyepiece for 2 solid hours, but I was still hoping for something a little more visually captivating, given it was supposed to be a "strong" shower at its peak.

[Bendy (Ben)]

Observed five meteors over the course of an hour in between clouds (unaided). Each was fast moving and short lived but a few were reasonably bright.

Interesting that you mentioned "eyepiece", I haven't done much meteor shower observing before and assumed it was purely an unaided eye thing. What sort of equipment can be used to aid meteor observations??

[Tropo-Bob (Bob)]

I saw many last night from an out-of-town site without knowing of this shower. Many were faint, slow and short, however one would have been mag -2 or -3 and was interesting in the sense that the head was not a point source but looked curved, a bit like a less curved, letter "c" sweeping across the sky. This is a first for me, I have been stargazing for 50 years and never previously seen a meteor with an elongated shaped head.

[gaseous (Patrick)]

Originally Posted by Bendy

Observed five meteors over the course of an hour in between clouds (unaided). Each was fast moving and short lived but a few were reasonably bright.

Interesting that you mentioned "eyepiece", I haven't done much meteor shower observing before and assumed it was purely an unaided eye thing. What sort of equipment can be used to aid meteor observations??

hi Ben,

I haven't done much either! I was using a fairly low power eyepiece (42mm GSO Superview) which in my 8" dob was giving about 28x magnification - more magnification than I really wanted, but I didn't fancy trying to hold binoculars for an extended period of time. I had it tracking the (alleged) centre of the shower, but as I got basically zilch, I may revert back to unaided eye observing next time, which is probably the time-honoured way of doing it anyway. Or strain my neck looking through binoculars on a tripod.

[StuTodd]

You have the southern, northern and delta Aquarids as well as radiants from Capricorn all in the same piece of sky!

This website/book is a work of Burnhams type goodness..
http://meteorshowersonline.com/july_radiants.html

Happy reading!

Stu

[doppler (Rick)]

Meteor shower observing is defiantly best done naked eye, laying back on a sun lounge or rug.

Had the scope and camera on the eagle nebula for a half hour last night around 10pm and captured this one on one frame.

[gaseous (Patrick)]

That's a pretty sweet photo!

[sharptrack2 (Kevin)]

A small group from the Central Coast, NSW, met up on Friday night to take advantage of clear skies. We all managed double digits for the night, starting around 17:30 until 00:30. We saw at least 4 very bright streakers, two of which broke apart in the last second or so. Admittedly, many didn't seem to come from the radiant early on, so it could be questioned if in fact they were Delta Aquarids, but it was a good show.

Most were seen while taking a break with a cuppa and just sitting back relaxing. A very nice evening all up despite the cold (2 degrees by midnight ).

[AussieTrooper (Ben)]

Originally Posted by gaseous

hi Ben,

I haven't done much either! I was using a fairly low power eyepiece (42mm GSO Superview) which in my 8" dob was giving about 28x magnification - more magnification than I really wanted, but I didn't fancy trying to hold binoculars for an extended period of time. I had it tracking the (alleged) centre of the shower, but as I got basically zilch, I may revert back to unaided eye observing next time, which is probably the time-honoured way of doing it anyway. Or strain my neck looking through binoculars on a tripod.

Aiming a telescope at the radiant won't do you much good. Meteors streak away from the radiant, they don't cross it.
It's much easier to lay back and use your eyes only, and it's the best way to observe the event.

[gaseous (Patrick)]

Thanks Ben, I've learned my lesson!