Posted on Wed 24 September 2014 in meteors
I had the pleasure to take part in the International Meteor Conference this weekend, which is an annual meeting organised by the International Meteor Organisation (for which I am a council member). The IMO is an international non-profit organisation which exists to encourage international cooperation between amateur astronomers in the …
Posted on Tue 20 May 2014 in meteors
There might be an outburst of the Camelopardalids meteor shower on May 24th near 7h Universal Time (UT). If you live in North or Middle America, you will want to keep an eye on the sky in the night from Friday on Saturday for one or two hours surrounding 7h …
Posted on Wed 28 August 2013 in meteors
I am currently attending the Meteoroids 2013 conference in Poland. At the meeting, Prof. Peter Brown has just alerted us to the fact that the Daytime Craterids meteor shower has unexpectedly been detected by the Canadian Meteor Orbit Radar (CMOR) this morning. You can see the radar detection for yourself …
Posted on Tue 13 August 2013 in meteors
The annual Perseids meteor shower peaked last night between 16h00m and 18h00m UT (12th August 2013). The peak ZHR was about 147 ± 17 meteors/hour.
The graphs below show the visual activity graphs, which I have been generating for the International Meteor Organization during each major meteor shower since 2006 …
Posted on Fri 07 June 2013 in meteors
On 11 June 1930, three meteor observers in Maryland (USA) witnessed a flurry of shooting stars originating from the constellation of Delphinus. The mysterious meteor shower, called the gamma-Delphinids, lasted less than 30 minutes. The shower had never been seen before, and it has never returned since... until this year?
Posted on Fri 15 February 2013 in meteors • Tagged with Chelyabinsk, Fireball
The internet is buzzing about a fireball which caused a powerful sonic boom over Chelyabinsk in Russia, injuring hundreds. A question asked by many is: how common is such event?
Posted on Wed 10 October 2012 in meteors
As reported in my previous post, the Draconids meteor shower showed an exceptional peak on the evening of 8 October 2012 near 17h UT. The peak was very pronounced in data from the Canadian Meteor Orbit Radar (CMOR), which reported rates up to 2300 meteors/hour. In fact, I am …
Posted on Mon 08 October 2012 in meteors
For the second year in a row, reports are emerging about a major peak in the activity of the Draconids meteor shower. Radar observing stations in Canada and in Germany reported up to 1000-2000 meteors/hour between 16h and 18h UT on 8 October 2012. Evidence for an outburst is …
