Once again, we enter into another annual meteor shower season, actually the two for late July: the Southern Delta Aquariids and the Alpha Capricornids. Both of them peak more towards the end of the month but they’re going on now and will be through much of August. My lack of luck with meteor showers is now legendary on the blog (meaning I won’t shut up about it,) but I still make the effort pretty frequently because, really, all it takes is sitting outside at night with the camera locked open, so what’s the effort in that? At least it doesn’t require bundling up against the cold.
We’re in a much better location for dark skies now, so it’s even easier than before when I had to go down to the lake, and even then the light pollution was significant. Here, I can sit on the back deck and at least see straight up, even though the trees and house prevent any other angles, and I can travel a short distance in many directions for views not straight up. Does this mean that I’ll finally get that spectacular fireball? No, of course not.
Last night I stretched out on the hammock on the deck alongside the tripod and fired off a few frames, until the haze moving in started to obscure too much, but I should be back out later on to try further. You can be sure that if I actually do get something cool, it’ll appear here. Unless I die of a heart attack from the shock…
