My wife was looking out of the window this evening when she saw, what I realised was a fireball. Although I missed the actual fireball, which lasted only a second or so, there was a clear trail for several minutes afterwards and I managed to take a few photos. On of these is attached. The meteor headed from the top right to bottom left.
The picture was taken with a Canon 350D is is therefore drastically reduced in size!
I used the curve function in Gimp to try and accentuate the trail a little, thus the compressed colours, but would certainly appreciate some advice on how to better process the image.
I'd also be interested on any thoughts on whether this fireball was random or connected with a metor shower (bit late for the Leonids I imagine). I'm in Mildura, northern Victora and the image was taken facing approximately ESE.
Thanks,
Everard
Looks like you may have been lucky enough to catch the reported "Meteorite" seen tonight ! http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599...0-1702,00.html
You may find the press will be interested in your Photos for the morning papers !
mate Ian's right, that pic is worth quite a few bucks, try and send it in quick! you would have to be first tho! i hope your still up!
did you hear the sonic boom that was mentioned in the other thread?
awesome! that is definitely a ripper and very rare! thanks for posting
Last edited by fringe_dweller; 28-11-2006 at 12:54 AM.
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Thanks for the kind comments everyone. We didn't hear the boom unfortunately.
Actually I've seen a fireball once before, years ago over in the UK. It was at night and very impressive with a big explosion at the end - didn't get a picture of that one though!
Just a bit of luck I had the camera handy. Pity I didn't have a tripod handy too or I could have got some longer exposures. BTW I actually meant WSW rather than ESE....
I wasn't too worried about trying to flog the pics, but I'll send it into the local paper and maybe one of the Oz astronomy mags?
Everard, looks like yours is the only image out there! I am truly surprised in this day of 3 MP phone camera's ect.! and the time of day.
Thanks again for posting it here you say you are facing wsw that would agree witht the sunset in the pic, so extrapolating from the only reliable image out there, the meteor came from NE, for you in Mildura, almost overhead by the looks of it..see next post
Thanks for further clarification Everard
Bear in mind most meteors, even fireballs, are individually rarely seen further than a 250klm radius from dead centre under them. They rarely get lower than 90 - 70klm from the earths surface visually, think of the curvature of the earth, (after that, if they have survived the entry, they literally drop like stones as by then, normally, they have been slowed to normal terminal velocity, as per earths gravity, and are no longer ablating brightly)
This monster was seen at points almost 1000 klm apart! equivalent of as seen from one end of Britian to the other!
reminds me of the biggy in '86 that was also seen from adelaide to melbourne, and actually made it to ground pretty rare to be seen so far afield.
[QUOTE=Solanum
I'd also be interested on any thoughts on whether this fireball was random or connected with a metor shower (bit late for the Leonids I imagine). [/QUOTE]
Just getting around to answering all your questions, re wether it was associated with a meteor shower, extrapolating it back to N/E in origin, using your report and excellent photo, I see their is a slight possiblity that it was a late Taurid - this from
'If large enough, these meteors may become bolides, with spectacular light shows and even audible sound.'
'The Taurids are also made up of weightier material, pebbles instead of dust grains.'
seeing the radiant was just above the horizon for you at that time, these are the most likliest to be the source if it belonged to a shower.
There is also a chance it was an early Geminid, they also can produce spectacular fireballs, but the radiant was waaay below the horizon at the time, so it would be unlikely.
but doesnt have to have pedigree to be a nice meteor, could of just as easily been a sporadic random event.
HTH
Last edited by fringe_dweller; 29-11-2006 at 09:37 PM.
My next door neighbour asked me yesterday If I saw it, and I got an email from a local today asking what it was! I had no idea what they were talking about.
This is the first I've heard of it. Geez I miss a lot of things doing shift-work!!!
Quaoar, the colours seen in bright meteors/fireballs is a debatable subject, greens are usually associated mostly with bright meteors/fireballs. It can be a combination of factors, including the exciting of rarefied gases in the upper atmosphere, in the case of green, oxygen, by the heated meteor ionising the particular gas. Some variables include meteor speed/angle, viewers visual perception and yes even the compostion of the meteoroid (no copper ones tho ).
I read of quite a few colours were used by witnesses to describe this beauty!
I have seen plenty of green ones, including a monster late geminid while out comet observing in dec 2004, that blinded us, it was so bright, to our dark adapted eye's, we couldnt even clearly focus on its form, it just looked like flashes of sheet lightning!
Ken, you sure that wasnt tuesday nights strange sightings they were talking about (Possibly fueled by the wide coverage of the fireball the night prior - that usually happens, gets ppl looking up at the stuff we are always looking at ) over ballarat?, the fireball that caused this imaged smoketrain was monday evening 8:30 pm for you guys.
while i'm here re distance viewable of an individual meteor, i forgot that with REALLY bright earthgrazer fireballs, they can in fact be easliy seen sometimes further afield than a average meteor. So it is possible for one like this to be seen over a 1000 klm footprint, centred on centerline! which makes my path plotting easier
a little bit Ian - but for the first 4 or so earliest, and most active years I did it, I/we were doing it *freestyle* so my/our counts didnt count, we were more into very casual obs. that was before I had internet.
after the leonids return era finished, and the eta aqaurids faded, and as the ever creeping LP, at our local dark sites, insidious pus filled tentacles strangled out the stars slowly over many years, I lost a bit of interest, I admit.
But the recently interesting Orionid display, and stalwart geminids might still send me back to the darkside more often.
I have seen that groups yahoo site, from memory it was a closed shop, I always like to try/lurk before I buy, so never joined mate.
But I have been a memeber of meteorobs, and read just about everything posted for about maybe around 5 years or so now? :-)
equivalent of as seen from one end of Britian to the other!
).
) over ballarat?, the fireball that caused this imaged smoketrain was monday evening 8:30 pm for you guys.
