The perseids are coming !

[gaa_ian]

Here is one for the meteor watchers (Mars is good at this time too)
If you can brave the morning winter chill the The perseid meteor shower hits its peak this friday morning.
Best seen by those of you in the northern part of Australia, this can be one of the best meteor showers of the year, for those willing to get up at 4 am.
I watched it last year & was suitably impressed, with the many bright meteors with long "trains", some covering 90deg of the sky.
Check it out at
http://comets.amsmeteors.org/meteors/showers/perseidobs.html

[iceman]

Awesome photo of the perseids on APOD today:

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap050806.html

[vindictive666]

allready made a note of it

i am up and around at that time anyway :) walking the dog :)

[ving]

you sir are crazy! the only place to be at that time is in bed! :P

[vindictive666]

no choice ving damm dog wakes up and carries on until i go and see him and let him loose so i am basically used to it now :)

plus i get to see the morning sky which i reckon is better then at night at the moment. saw a meteor as well this morning as i did a few weeks ago :)

cool stuff :)

[gaa_ian]

Very cool picture Ice :thumbsup:
I will use that link in my article for the local paper this week

[gaa_ian]

OK folks ... for those of you in the northern 1/3 of the country...
Tomorrow morning is the start of the perseids peak
I will be out at 4 am looking over the arafura sea . counting and enjoying the show over a thermos of hot coffee
I would love to hear any reports tomorrow that other meteor watches may have ...
Counts / hr and the reports of the most visually spectacular meteors ...

[gaa_ian]

OK ... the first peak of the perseids, this morning was quite a good show with about 25 in the 1 1/2 hours to 5:45am.
Also saw, perhaps 20 sporadic meteors over that time as well as a bright Iridium flare at Mag -4.
Hopefully tomorrow morning will be even better :thumbsup:
So tell me ... did anyone else in our wide brown land get out for a look ?

[evo]

A few questions at the risk of proving me to be the absolute novice I am....
1) Any chance of seeing these in Sydney with the city lights?
2) Is it best to observe with naked eye, or through scope, or bin's?
3) Which direction in sky?
Sorry for the ludicrously stoopid questions!

Best wishes, Mike

[gaa_ian]

No Worries Mike, no such thing as a stoopid question here !
1. You may see some of the brighter ones rising up from the northern horizon as the radiant is pretty much on your northern horizon.
2. All meteor showers are a naked eye event (see links at the start of this thread)
3. See 1.
Hope you get to see some :eyepop:

[fringe_dweller]

Thanks for the report Ian - much appreciated in the generally Perseid poor south. Its the one decent shower I/we dont go out to watch, even if its occurs like this time around, in a moon free period. 45, Not a bad overall tally :-) a nice catch for before breakfast! worth staying up/getting out of bed for! Love this sport - dont need to be a millionaire to enjoy it!
Mike, The annual Geminids shower in december is usually the best major shower for southerners these days I'm afraid - the Eta Aquarids have just about disappeared visually, the populations getting too faint possibly? (still not real bad in radio obs) and the leonids have gone back to its old normal levels it appears. And both Gems and Leo's peaks occur during full moons this year :-( Looks like we are down to discovering new 2/hr southern showers for entertainment maybe?
One thing about the radiants of the major northern/equatorial showers being very low in far southern skies, it tends to make the few we do see, more likely to be nice bright earthgrazers - small consolation though?
City observing of meteors is hard, as you know, as the majority of members of shower populations seem to be in the dimmer 3/4-7 mag range, and even much less, so in mag >4.5 inner city skies your really up against it on most occasions. Not to be too discouraging , I have had some half decent sessions in the suburbs sometimes.
Even between a darkish site to a really dark site, we have noticed a large difference in counts ect and impressiveness. At truly dark skies the fainter mag 6's and 7's can even look impressive as well, and mag 4's look like fireballs hehe. :-)
Kearn
PS btw one of my favs these days are the Sagittarids in may (usually while out for eta's) love seeing them smoke and streak magnificently out of the heart of the milky way overhead - very impressive, if a little on the thin side in numbers.

[evo]

thanks chaps for the good oil. that settles it - going to give it a shot. what a suck of a night for sleep - stumps pull up in the ashes then the meteors begin!!! Let's hope the meteors put on more of a show than the Aussies!

best wishes, mike

[gaa_ian]

Glad to see someone else is enjoying the show :thumbsup:
This mornings shower was even better !
I recorded 40 perseid meteor's in the 1 1/2 hrs to 5:45 am.
at least a dozen of these left smoking trails, one which lasted for a least 1 minute.
On top of this there was a good number of sporadic meteors, with many of them seeming to have a radiant in the Orion/Taurus region, must just be a chance grouping though I guess.
I total I would have seen 60 odd meteors this morning, worth getting up early for :clap:

[fringe_dweller]

sounds like it was a good show! I have always liked ykchia's work - and he has done well again - he lives in Singapore, so his timeline ect. is not far removed from ours of course being a neighbour - see http://www.ykchia.com/more_meteors.htm the wmv file is a beauty - he does this all out of his apartment window generally I think - amazing! :)
kearn

[gaa_ian]

Very good indeed !
I would like to have a go at some shots like that, once I get a decent digital camera I will give it a try :camera:
Some of the better cameras work in Burst mode, where you can take a series of shots automaticlly in succession.
If this can be done on a series of long exposures, you should be able to get some good shots :stargaze:

[iceman]

Here's a great shot by Stefan, a very good astrophotographer.

http://www.astromeeting.de/atmospheric/050812perseids_a.htm

[Mikezoom]

Bump

Perseids time again, anyone going out for a look? I know the Moon might reduce the chance of seeing all the meteors but I will still tough it out.

Mike.B.

[gaa_ian]

I think we have missed the peak on the 12th & 13th, with the almost full moon :(

[ballaratdragons]

I don't know if it has anything to do with the Perseids or not but I seem to have quite a few slowish yellow meteors tonight mixed in amongst the usual fast white ones.

I am a bit too far south, and it's too early in the night, but there is quite a few of them happening! :shrug:

[Mikezoom]

Bumb...... wow almost a year b'tween bumps.

Perseid time again. :lol:

New moon and a cloudless (hopefully) few nights here. Might have to let the missus know Im on the couch over the next few nights. :rolleyes:

Mikezoom.

[ballaratdragons]

Yep Mike,

I recieved the email about them today from Spaceweather.

But very hard to see from way down here. Last year we had some very bright meteors at Persieds time, but they were too early in the evening for Persieds.

But no doubt I'll still attempt to see them :)

[Mikezoom]

Good to see Ken. :)

Miss my dark skies from Wagga Wagga but still pull the ol' gal out from time to time to peruse. Seem to do a lot more naked eye & binno work up here.

Lets hope some make it down your way and put on a show. ;)

Mike.

[davidpretorius]

fingers crossed, weather not lookin good!

[gaa_ian]

Hi Fellas
Yes, we will certainly be watching for them again up here in the top end !
Lets see how many people I can find who want to get up at 4am in the morning again this year.
I've been a bit full on here lately, Our National Science week events planning is all consuming
& we had a huge weekend at Garma last weekend! http://www.garma.telstra.com/
But we will still fit in an observing night this weekend :D

[ispom]

Hallo friends of the Perseides,
firstly it looked not good, many clouds…
but the weather forecast promised after midnight clear skies.

And so I could see in an hour over 20 meteors, a few very light with smoking wads!
Will hope, this night the seeing is similar beautiful

[Astroman]

I saw 1 this morning LOL was amazed I even saw that...

[Muddy Diver]

Hi Guys

I'm off to Perth this morning and staying overnight so I'm thinking about taking my camera (and our reps car) early doors to see these. Thing is I'm not sure at what time (Perth) to be looking for them and in what direction. :shrug:Can anyone drop me a PM to let me know (I'll be able to get a pm while mobile)

Thanks all