--- Joe Bauman <bau@desnews.com> wrote:
Hi all, a woman called and said she and her husband saw two meteors last night around Point of the Mountain. They were bright and went nearly to ground level. Anyone have any idea what this might be? Anyone else see anything? Thanks, Joe
See the description of the Taurid streams in the IMO Fall calendar at: http://www.imo.net/calendar/2005/fall Currently, there are three meteor showers that are mildy active above the background rate : 1) Southern Taurids (STA) Oct 01-Nov 25 Nov 05 223° 52° +13° 27 2.3 5 Maximum ZHR of 5 on Nov. 5 2) Northern Taurids (NTA) Oct 01-Nov 25 Nov 12 230° 58° +22° 29 2.3 5 Maximum ZHR of 5 on Nov. 12 3) The tail end of the Orionids The IMO 2005 Calendar states for the Taurids, that are associated with Comet2P/Encke that: "In 1995, an impressive crop of bright Taurids occured between late October to mid November, while in 1998, Taurid ZHRs reached levels comparable to the usual maximum rates in late October, together with an increased flux of brighter Taurids generally. This year brings the next potential October-November 'swarm' return." With a ZHR of 5 for the Taurids, you have to read the term "swarm" relatively. While out looking at Mars last Sunday over two hours, three meteors caught my eye between bouts at the eyepiece, although I was concentrating on Mars. Two were about mag 2 to 3, one was a bright bolid that went down to about 30-40 degrees above the southern horizon. I only caught the tail end of the last one. My back was turned to it and its initial brightness caused me to quickly look over my shoulder. The direction of all three pointed back to the Taurid-Orion radiant areas. Because of their relative brightness and direction, I did not associat these with the usual background activity of 3-4 meteors per hour. - Canopus56(Kurt) __________________________________ Start your day with Yahoo! - Make it your home page! http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs