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Geminid Anti radiant point captured.
Another great shot Colin, and a very important one as far as meteor showers go. What you have also captured is some evidence for the anti-radiant point of the Geminid meteor shower. Because from our latitudes, in my place 40 south, the actual radiant point is so low even at its highest, there is a chance to see the point where all of the meteors are heading to.
It takes a very active shower to make this easy to see, so not surprisingly I first became aware of this during the Great Leonid Shower of 1998. It was quite clear with the appearance of flurries of Leonids converging low in the SSW that it was worth looking in that direction as well.
This was confirmed for me six years ago when a good astrophotographer mate of mine, Graham Palmer, travelled the 100 miles to my place for a clear view of the Geminids and a chance for an aurora. Armed with his new didgital SLR, Graham started patrolling the sky, but as is often the case the meteors appeared everywhere except in his field of view. This was the best Geminids display that I had seen for sometime(the night of the 14th). In the end Graham concentrated on capturing any sign of auroral glow. No luck there either but he did get one the next night when he crossed back over the Tararua Ranges and headed further south, capturing the last display from SunSpot Cycle 23 to be seen from the North Island of New Zealand.
While Graham was trying for aurora we couldn't help but notice Geminids converging near Pavo. When I saw your shot it got me to thinking about comparing the path of your meteor to any anti-radiant point for the Geminids. I used some coordinates for the Geminids given on a web site. There was no specific date given for when the coordinates applied. I grabbed a chart from S&T inverted it and roughly plotted my calculated anti-radiant point and then added your meteor. What it shows to me is the fact that the radiant and therefore anti-radiant point moves across the sky as the earth moves around the sun. I also annotated your image so that people can easily see the outline of Pavo.
This may encourage others to turn their backs on Gemini next time and photograph our beautiful southern sky, as well as capture some Gem's at the same time!
Cheers
Coops.
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