Quote:
Originally Posted by eamsie
Sorry Rob, this is a newbie question but what are these "flash impressions" you mentioned? Is this just from magnetic forces?
|
Bit out of my depth here as I've never seen one through a telescope! No eamsie, I just mean like a bright visual flash across the field (for bright meteors). I've read that the average meteor duration in visual sightings is 0.4 sec. People often estimate longer averages because it is difficult to reconcile such fleeting phenomena against a full second, which is actually quite a long time. Of course meteor speeds vary and with a bright 'slow' fireball travelling a long distance across the sky you might have a second or two (or more) to observe it with the naked eye.
With a 0.4 sec duration meteor scribing say a 10-degree arc through the sky, and viewing a half-degree diameter field through your telescope, the meteor would cross the field in 0.02 sec. That's two one-hundredths of a second! If it was a dim one it mightn't even register to your eye - a very bright one might register more or less as an instantaneous flash. But
no meteor (however 'fast' or 'slow') would be the sort of thing you could calmly watch enter one side of your telescopic field, cross the field, and exit the other side.
Maybe someone who's seen one could comment.
Cheers -