Results of the AKM Video Meteor Network - February 2001 ======================================================= February 2001 was one of the months you better forget soon. Not only meteor activity was poor, but also the weather was far from good allowing only very few video observations. Who knows, maybe this was simply necessary after the quite successful observations in December and January. Two things are noteworthy: First there seems to be a clear increase in meteor activity around February 15. Currently we are analyzing whether the large number of sporadic meteors belong to an unknown (?) minor shower. Second our network finally got the long-awaited extension towards the southern hemisphere. Rob McNaught now regularly operates his camera system with MetRec. Thanks to the better weather and much better skies in the Australian outback he was able to record more meteors than all Europeans together despite his shorter summer nights. That's not yet all: Currently his colleague Steve Quirks installs a second automatic station, and soon they will carry out double-station observations on a regular basis! The corresponding analysis software is not yet finished, but given this progress it will probably take no longer than two years to finally remove the white spots from the meteor shower map of the southern sky. What remains is the question, how long our network should be called the "AKM video network". I decided to rename it to "IMO video network" as soon as there are more active video stations abroad than in Germany. So far the German cameras are clearly in the majority. By the way, by now all observations until the end of 2000 are completely archived. All positional data (24203 meteors from 397 nights) can be downloaded in IMO's PosDat format for free from the homepage of IMO (http://www.imo.net/video/metrec). The full database with all images, log files, and meteor sequences can be obtained on 6 CD Roms from me at cost (10 Euro + shipping). 1. Observers ============ Code Name Place Camera FOV LM Nights Time Meteors -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- KNOAN Knoefel Duesseldorf VIDEOMET (0.75/50) 20 dg 7 mag 3 24.6 h 26 MCNRO McNaught COOnabarabran SSO1 (1.2/85) 13 dg 9 mag 10 42.3 h 480 MOLSI Molau Aachen AVIS (2.0/35) 40 dg 5 mag 5 34.2 h 141 NITMI Nitschke Dresden VK1 (0.75/50) 20 dg 8 mag 2 10.0 h 25 RENJU Rendtel Marquardt CARMEN (1.8/28) 28 dg 5 mag 10 69.1 h 69 STRJO Strunk Leopoldshoehe FAMOS (2.0/28) 45 dg 5 mag 5 31.6 h 101 YRJIL Yrjola Kuusankosi NONAME (2.0/35) 35 dg 6 mag 3 19.7 h 8 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Overall 16 231.5 h 850 2. Observing Times (h) ====================== Feb 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- KNOAN - - - - - - - - 11.6 - - - - - - MCNRO 1.7 4.3 - 3.5 - - - - - - - - 2.0 3.1 - MOLSI - - - - - - - - - 5.1 - - 3.9 10.1 11.6 NITMI - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 5.0 RENJU - 5.2 - - - - - - - 7.8 - - 8.0 - 11.2 STRJO - - - - - - - - - - - - 3.0 11.4 11.4 YRJIL - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum 1.7 9.5 - 3.5 - - - - 11.6 12.9 - - 16.9 24.6 39.2 Feb 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- KNOAN - - - - - - - - 4.4 - 8.6 - - MCNRO - - - - - - - 6.4 7.5 4.2 5.7 - 3.9 MOLSI - - - - - - - - - 3.5 - - - NITMI - - - - - - - - - - - 5.0 - RENJU - - 6.6 - - - - 1.9 4.6 - 9.8 10.0 4.0 STRJO - - - - - - - 4.5 1.3 - - - - YRJIL - - - - - - 6.5 - 4.5 8.7 - - - ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum - - 6.6 - - - 6.5 12.8 22.3 16.4 24.1 15.0 7.9 3. Results (Meteors) ==================== Feb 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- KNOAN - - - - - - - - 15 - - - - - - MCNRO 76 78 - 29 - - - - - - - - 19 10 - MOLSI - - - - - - - - - 12 - - 10 37 67 NITMI - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 7 RENJU - 7 - - - - - - - 4 - - 6 - 27 STRJO - - - - - - - - - - - - 5 41 47 YRJIL - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum 76 85 - 29 - - - - 15 16 - - 40 88 148 Feb 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- KNOAN - - - - - - - - 2 - 9 - - MCNRO - - - - - - - 53 86 63 38 - 28 MOLSI - - - - - - - - - 15 - - - NITMI - - - - - - - - - - - 18 - RENJU - - 4 - - - - 3 3 - 8 5 2 STRJO - - - - - - - 7 1 - - - - YRJIL - - - - - - 2 - 2 4 - - - ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum - - 4 - - - 2 63 94 82 55 23 30 Sirko Molau, 2001/03/09