Meteor/Meteorite News 15DEC2010

Geminid Meteor Show  2010 Chris Peterson (c) 2010
 http://www.cloudbait.com/science/geminid2010.html

Reported by Chris Peterson- Cloudbait Observatory
The annual Geminid meteor shower occurs when debris from the asteroid 3200 Phaethon intercepts the Earth. This is an unusual type of shower in having an asteroidal, rather than cometary parent. However, evidence suggests that Phaethon is actually the rocky core of an evaporated comet. These meteors intercept the Earth at a fairly low speed of 35 km/s (79,000 mph). Because of this, Geminids tend to be slow and colorful- probably the prettiest of the major showers.

This is a composite image of 363 Geminid meteors collected between sunset on December 10 and sunrise on December 14 (19, 31, 89, and 229 meteors respectively). Since the images were collected over many hours, the radiant of the shower is not in a fixed location. Conditions this year were good, with little interference from the Moon and largely clear skies.

Long necklace-like trails on the image are the paths of stars and planets, circling the north celestial pole in the upper left.

This image contains only meteors identified as Geminids. Several other showers are currently active as well. Recorded, but not shown in the composite, are 30 Puppid-Velids, 58 Monocerotids, 7 Chi Orionids, 49 Sigma Hydrids, and 80 sporadics.  (more)  see  http://www.cloudbait.com/science/geminid2010.html


Catch a falling star and find out where it came from
Imperial College London
by Colin Smith Scientists are celebrating the discovery of a second meteorite in the Western Australian desert using 'star gazing' cameras. ...


Meteorite Men' Star Clears Up Misconceptions About Meteors
Yahoo! News
"Hollywood has done a really good job misrepresenting meteors," says Steve Arnold, one of the Science Channel's Meteorite Men. They always show meteors as ...


Geminids 2010: visual data quicklook
gem2010_rate.csv (number of meteors per interval per observer) ... Handbook for meteorobservations; Chapter 9, Analyses and Calculations. ...
www.imo.net/live/geminids2010/


elp allsky: Meteor News...Oklahoma City, Edmond, Ardmore, Enid ...
By El Paso AllSky Camera
Reports coming in to ELPALLSKY of an Oklahoma Fireball... Dec 13 2010, 6:33 PM wulfpig (guest) Reports: Traveling North on 1-35 in Edmond Oklahoma 12-13-10 just before 6:00pm central standard time and saw a meteor (?) in the northwest. ...


NASA MSFC on USTREAM: .
NASA MSFC @ USTREAM: Ready to stay up all night? On Monday, Dec. 13 from 11:00 pm to 5:00 am EST, meteor experts Bill ...


"Aurora Fireball" by Yuichi Takasaka (TWAN)
A bright meteor streaks the sky of Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories, Canada. The area is best known for viewing the northern nights. ...


SPACE.com: Image of GEM with Sentinel All Sky Camera , Hillo, Mex.
Max Peak of GEM and Images:

http://www.space.com/nightsky/geminid-meteor-shower-photos-101214.html
and image of All Sky Camera Sentinel ( Sandia National Labs) Hillo, Son,
Mexico. http://bit.ly/gARUQG

Reported by Salvador Aguirre

Skywatchers Capture Gorgeous Photos of Geminid Meteor ShowerLiveScience.com
By Clara Moskowitz, SPACE.com Senior Writer The year's best meteor shower peaked last night (Dec. 13), giving skywatchers around the world an incredible ...

Darwin vs. the Sun

Universe Today
These ranged from burning coal to a constant bombardment of comets and meteors to slow contraction. Each of these methods seemed initially plausible, ...

Geminid Meteor Shower 2010: Videos From December 13, 14
Huffington Post
As we reported yesterday, the 2010 Geminid meteor shower peaked late last night and early this morning. Fortunately, for those who missed it, ...

Colorado Bright Fireball 23JUN2010 25JUN2010

I recorded a very bright fireball (mag -13) over Colorado on June 23 at UT
08:49. The radiant of this event was within my measurement error of the
radiant of the June Lyrid shower, which is suggested by the IMO as a
"possible source", and seems to have been more active in the 1960s. I
obtained an initial velocity of 47 km/s, which is high compared with the IMO
estimate of 31 km/s (I don't know how that speed was obtained).

In any case, this is an interesting fireball that fragmented explosively at
a height of 53 km. I have posted a report at
http://www.cloudbait.com/science/fireball20100623.html

; be sure to check
the nice videos from two of my allsky cameras. Tom Ashcraft also caught this
on his allsky camera in New Mexico, over 400 km to the south.

Be sure to view the videos- the terminal explosion is very impressive.

Chris

**********************
Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com