March 2010

..two SPOs

Quiet Feburary Sky

Only one detected meteor throughout the night. Pointers and the Crux lower left.

Jan 27/28 2010

Jan 24 2010 Video Patrol

Close to dawn two negative magnitude sporadic meteors appeared.  Note Crux at lower left and the 'double' image of Sirius which correspond to the last two meteor entries just mentioned.

Meteor with long path length

 Selected frame to show the progression of the meteor flight.

2:43 am - the system detected a meteor dragging a short tail  transversing  the FOV. (89x64). The path looks curved due to the wide angle distortion from the lens.

7 minutes later another meteor was detected.

Cloudy sky meteors

The one that got away

Partial Solar Eclipse Jan 15 2010

Friday Afternoon  Partial Eclipse  -  Maximum coverage is around 21%. 

Simulation of Jan 15 '10 Solar partial Eclipse

25mm f0.95 wat902H2 Ultimate

Meteor near ' Pointers'

Sky continued to be cloudy..  A lone meteor with flarings ended near the Pointers to Crux

Javelin in the sky - slow meteor dec 26 2009

A slow meteor with no visible flareup or terminal burst making it ways across the sky.

A straight down meteor

A negative meteor vertical plunged
and planted itself exactly along the TV antennae - pole above ...
Sirius brightest star on top..while this one grazed the edge of the opposite block Dec 08 2009 05:06:39 am

A Poem - What if we threw a (star) party and nobody came?

What if we threw a (star) party and nobody came?

It was the night of the Geminids,
In the year two thousand and nine.
The announcements and emails were sent,
According to the grand design.

I am at the Observatory,
Ready for the crowds to arrive,
Without a moon, with an open sky,
This year the meteors should thrive.

Sunset is here, but the clouds won=92t part.
And to top it all off, heavy fog.
What if nobody decides to come?
That will not look good in the log.

With fingers crossed and my hopes not lost,
I anxiously sit without fear.
For although it looks quite foreboding,
The Canadians said it would clear!

Yet here I sit, lest someone should come,
Without even one star to see.
For hours and hours, with roof closed;
The lonely astronomer me.

Even the other astronomers,
Who stayed warm, at home, without blame,
On the night we threw a star party,
And the night that nobody came!

      by Aaron Clevenson

Predictable sprites location - changing lens to have a closer look

A tight group of sprites seen near bottom
wide angle 3.8mm - i knew it is going to repeat soon..

Yes it did... this is 25mm f0.95 avenir lens

and still in 75 mm f1.4 FOV -

note the group on the left and the single 'fork' like on the right

Now watch the video posted to youtube

(clouded) UT 14 [ local 15] Dec 2009

Click the image to have a closer look of this typical Gem

Clouded out UT Dec 13 2009

A nice bright Geminid accompany by other members...
We are clouded out ... the video patrol system picks up a handful of meteors visible through gaps and thinner cloud layers..

(UT) 12-Dec-2009 Geminids

Dawn approaching .... another hot weather ahead

Around 6am I shifted the FOV to cover western end of the sky, but soon the clouds rolling in.

Image above showing the 17/25 Gems from UT 14-22 Dec 12 2009
Video posted to youtube

Video 3.8mm f0.8 auto IRIS, wat902H
(UT) |Local time| n |Gem(n) ..
-----------------------------
15 23 3 Gem(2) Hyd(1)
16 00 6 Gem(6)
17 01 6 Gem(4) Urs(1)Spo(1)
18 02 6 Gem(4) nTau(1)Spo(1)
19 03 4 Gem(4)
20 04 4 Gem(3) Urs(1)
21 05 1 Gem(2)

Dec 11/12 Meteors ( Gems)

SPO steal the 'thunder'...

x4 Gems in above stacked images
- [ 19]03:16, 03:31,03:35,[20]04:26
[UT] local time when the radiant is at its highest.

Geminids Dec 14 2009 Watch Window for SGP

Radiant around mid night (~ 40 degree), Castor Pollux on top left chart.

Credit IMO 2008 Gems actual data ZHR chart

Using above chart from IMO last year result as illustration

i) Notice the sharp peak occurred during daylight Singapore time ( 5h 10m UT => 13h 10m Dec 15)
ii) The asymmetric peak - broad activity prior to peak and steep decrease of activity post peak

So lets bracketing the peak -

-watch Dec 12 Sat 9pm onwards till Dec 13 Sunday am
- watch Dec 13 Sun 9pm onwards till Dec 14 Monday 2009.


*Radiant: [ midnight ~ 40 degree] , [3 AM ~ 60 degree]

*The higher the radiant the more Geminids you are going to get.

Geminid... My first Gem for the year 2009