Why yes, I was out early this morning in pursuit of astronomical shenanigans, to see if our impish little moon was playing hide-and-seek. Well, there was no uncertainty about that, since we’ve possessed the knowledge of orbital mechanics since before we called a hashtag a pound sign – it was definitely going to happen. But there remained the question of whether I
Tag: meteor shower
Not that lazy
Two posts back, I mentioned the Leonids meteor shower, and how it might be useful to go out earlier than the peak of the 17th/18th to see what could be found. I will smugly inform you that this was not a case of, “Do as I say, not as I do,” because I did go out to a dark sky location nearby, in the wee hours of the morning on the 11th (so, an hour or so after posting that,) and made
I’m just sayin’…
… that the Leonids meteor shower will be peaking on November 17th, but it’s going on right now. And in fact, it’s better to try and catch it before peak, because presently the moon sets early and the best time to see meteors is after midnight, so the skies are better the earlier you try. By the 17th, the moon will be about full and not set until 5 am or so.
The constellation Leo,
Glutton for punishment?
I know I am. That’s why you’ll see me down at the lake in a few nights, because the Perseids meteor shower is peaking on August 12th, but of course, you’re likely to still see some within a few days before or after, so whenever the conditions suit you, have at it.
The nicer bit is, the moon will be a waxing crescent, so setting in the early part of the evening and long gone by midnight,
Are you kidding me?
I’d seen the skies looking quite clear yesterday evening, the first time in days, so I thought I’d try for the meteor storm, and early this morning (like a little after midnight,) I drove down to Jordan Lake, the best night sky spot in the area, to see what I could see.
The first thing was, the humidity was very high and the haze had rolled in, so only stars of higher magnitude were visible
Just so you know you missed them
In a few days at the end of the month, both the southern delta Aquariids and the alpha Capricornids (both meteor showers, and that’s apparently the way you should capitalize them) will be peaking, though I really should have told you about this earlier, because now the moon will be still a bit bright and visibility thus greatly reduced for all but the brightest meteors – both were ‘active’
More things happening
In the next couple of days (May 5th and 6th, to be precise,) the Eta Aquarids meteor shower should be peaking – this is one of two meteor showers caused by debris from Comet Halley (the other being the Orionids in October.) However, Aquarius is the radiant and
This week in Things
I have routine event reminders in my home calendar, a remnant from the period that I actually had a calendar attached to the blog with nature-photography-related events thereon – only about half of those were carried over, and of those, most of them I don’t post about. But I retained the meteor shower data, so I can tell you that the Lyrids meteor shower is due to peak
A correction: Not even a whisker
Back on November 18th, I posted about going out early that morning to try and snag some of the Leonids meteor shower that was peaking then, and successfully capturing a couple. But a few days after that post as I was sorting the images, I looked closely at a few of them
On this day (a whisker of success)
In the previous post, I mentioned attempting in vain to capture any of the Leonid meteors nine years ago, ending with, “Leave it to me to chase meteors on the colder nights…” And since it was 4°C at 4 AM this morning, guess what I decided to attempt again?
The primary difference being, this time I was moderately successful!
But first off, the false alarm.
I saw a