Orionids

[Kunama]

While my scope sits in a box, waiting for the new GP-D2 to arrive from Japan, I decided to get back to basics and spent several hours with a pair 8X binoculars watching the Orionid meteors screaming by, Jupiter and the continual criss-crossing of satellites and space junk overhead.

No polar alignment to worry about, no cables, no batteries running low, just me and the beautiful dark sky over the Snowy Mountains .............. heaven !!!!

[Waxing_Gibbous (Peter)]

It's quite pleasant just getting out there with some binos and watching the sky.
I mean, I guess.
I can't really remember.
It might have been May or June the last time I had anything approaching favourable "space weather".
Almost happend Friday
But as soon as I wheeled the scope out - Bam!
Cloud.

[Kunama]

The clouds are coming back here as well....... not expecting much viewing tonight. I am at about 1000m altitude so when it is clear it is REALLY clear here. I have spoken to the neighbours so now they don't leave any lights on at night .......
My next project is to attach a can of black paint to the end of a 5m long pole and rig a trigger to spray the side of 2 street lights then it will be a very dark site.

[ourkind (Carlos)]

Nice to hear you caught some I was out until 3 am at a local beach last night overlooking Orion and saw the occasional one cross overhead but not from the direction of Orion. Still I enjoyed just looking into space.

[GrampianStars (Rob)]

Originally Posted by Kunama

The clouds are coming back here as well....... not expecting much viewing tonight. I am at about 1000m altitude so when it is clear it is REALLY clear here.....

Not looking good here either for the peak tonight
heavy Cumulus clouds rolling in......

[Regulus (Trevor)]

I was out at 4.30 and Orion was perhaps a bit high so all I saw was Jupiter (Very Nice) Betelgeuse (One of my 3 favourite Stars) and lots of satellites in N-S orbits and then topped it off with the ISS. Still a beautiful morning to be up early here in NW Tasmania.

[lepton3 (Ivan)]

Was out from 2 am to 5:30 am on the 20th. Admittedly was concentrating mostly on imaging Jupiter, but in-between kept an eye out for Orionids.

This is in suburbia, so pretty light polluted, still I saw 1 sporadic and 3 Orionids (2 nice and bright, and one REALLY bright). Those Orionids are FAST.

Add in an ISS flyover, and it was a very pleasant morning.

[Danack (Dan Ackroyd)]

Originally Posted by Regulus

I was out at 4.30 and Orion was perhaps a bit high

I was visiting my sister in Wales and watched the sky from about 3:45am to 4:45am and saw about 10 Orionids, though probably missed some as I was also setting up a camera for a star trail (sky too light for a good one unfortunately).

Turns out that Wales is quite cool at that time of night at the end of October, even with a nice warm glass of ale, so couldn't hold out to see if the rate increased towards dawn.

[JB80 (Jarrod)]

Last night was a total bust weatherwise, tonight is looking clearish and hazy, certainly I wouldn't set up scope up with this seeing. I imagine by the time the kids are in bed and we have had dinner the fog would have rolled in. If it gets clearer I might get adventurous and take the camera out too.

We'll see, if I can see just one I will have deemed the whole experiment a success and retire with a nice cold one.

[lepton3 (Ivan)]

This morning (22nd) is one night after the peak. Was finishing up a long photometry run at 2:30am so I thought I'd stay out for another hour and see if there was any Orionid activity to be seen.

In that hour I saw 2 Orionids and 2 sporadics. I love these showers, they give you something to do while you are waiting for darks, or for the camera to warm up or whatever.

Looking forward to the Leonids in November.