Results of the AKM Video Meteor Network - March 2001
====================================================
The summary of March has to be divided into two sections, as already
a short glimpse on the statistics reveals.
First there is central Europe: Those who thought the extremely poor weather
in March 2000 was an exception were proved wrong in this year. Again we
could observe only in a couple of nights, in many of these even for a short
time only. Detlef Koschny had no clear night at all at the Dutch North Sea
border. Meteor activity was demotivating as well. Even though Ilkka
Yrjola had better skies in the second part of March, he recorded only
34 meteors in 56 hours. Even my own camera had in some clear nights an
average of less than one meteor per hour. If you then like Juergen
Rendtel had to finish some observations right after measuring the
reference stars as the next cloud front arrived, bad mood was the logical
consequence.
Then there are the March observations of Rob McNaught in Australia, who
immediately broke all of our records. Never before an individual observer
managed to aquire 24 observing nights ine one month. No observer ever
accumulated more than 150 hours a month, not to mention the incredible
number of 2,858 meteors. To put that number into the right relation: This
camera alone recorded in some nights more meteors than the European
cameras in March alltogether. 2,858 meteors are exactly 8 more meteors
than Juergens camera captured in 150 nights in the whole of 2000! It's
just breath-taking...
At the end of March Rob operated a second camera without image intensifier.
It's a very sensitive CCD video camera (Watec-902H) which shows quite an
amazing performance. Maybe this camera has a similar sensitivity under
light-polluted skies as an ordinary image-intensified system. Then it
could be a real alternative, even though it is quite expensive.
Last but not least I want to mention the new address of the MetRec homepage,
which now has it's own domain: WWW.METREC.ORG
1. Observers
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Code Name Place Camera FOV LM Nights Time Meteors
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KNOAN Knoefel Duesseldorf VIDEOMET (0.75/50) 20 dg 7 mag 2 6.7 h 11
MCNRO McNaught Coonabarabran SSO1 (1.2/85) 13 dg 9 mag 24 186.1 h 2858
SSO1-WAT1 (1.4/8) 57 dg 4 mag 3 18.3 h 10
MOLSI Molau Aachen AVIS (2.0/35) 40 dg 5 mag 9 28.0 h 71
NITMI Nitschke Dresden VK1 (0.75/50) 20 dg 8 mag 3 15.0 h 15
RENJU Rendtel Marquardt CARMEN (1.8/28) 28 dg 5 mag 3 18.1 h 17
STRJO Strunk Leopoldshoehe FAMOS (2.0/28) 45 dg 5 mag 5 38.1 h 59
YRJIL Yrjola Kuusankosi NONAME (2.0/35) 35 dg 6 mag 9 56.1 h 34
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Overall 28 366.4 h 3075
2. Observing Times (h)
======================
Mar 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15
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KNOAN - - - - 5.6 - - - - - - - - - -
MCNRO 5.9 7.2 8.2 8.5 8.7 4.3 8.4 - 6.8 - 2.8 9.2 9.0 - 6.8
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
MOLSI - - - - 6.7 1.4 - 2.2 - - - 2.5 3.2 - -
NITMI - 5.0 - - - 5.0 - - - - - - - - -
RENJU - - - - 4.8 6.1 - - - - - - - - -
STRJO - - - - 8.0 9.9 - - - - - - - - -
YRJIL - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
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Sum 5.9 12.2 8.2 8.5 33.8 26.7 8.4 2.2 6.8 - 2.8 11.7 12.2 - 6.8
Mar 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
KNOAN - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1.1
MCNRO - - 9.2 9.2 8.1 6.7 8.2 2.5 - - 9.3 9.3 9.3 9.5 9.3 9.7
- - - - - - - - - - - - 9.1 6.1 - 3.1
MOLSI - - - 6.9 - - - - - - - 1.6 1.5 2.0 - -
NITMI - - - - - - - - - - - - - 5.0 - -
RENJU - - - - 7.2 - - - - - - - - - - -
STRJO - - - - - - - - - - 6.2 8.4 - - 5.6 -
YRJIL - 8.0 - 8.0 8.0 3.0 - 4.2 7.3 4.7 6.3 6.6 - - - -
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Sum - 8.0 9.2 24.1 23.3 9.7 8.2 6.7 7.3 4.7 21.8 25.9 19.9 22.6 14.9 13.9
3. Results (Meteors)
====================
Mar 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15
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KNOAN - - - - 10 - - - - - - - - - -
MCNRO 103 25 136 134 158 73 26 - 8 - 8 78 121 - 76
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
MOLSI - - - - 29 2 - 3 - - - 7 5 - -
NITMI - 6 - - - 4 - - - - - - - - -
RENJU - - - - 3 6 - - - - - - - - -
STRJO - - - - 11 1 - - - - - - - - -
YRJIL - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
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Sum 103 31 136 134 211 86 26 3 8 - 8 85 126 - 76
Mar 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
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KNOAN - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1
MCNRO - - 235 219 42 220 174 3 - - 133 234 170 174 189 119
- - - - - - - - - - - - 4 3 - 3
MOLSI - - - 20 - - - - - - - 3 1 1 - -
NITMI - - - - - - - - - - - - - 5 - -
RENJU - - - - 8 - - - - - - - - - - -
STRJO - - - - - - - - - - 20 15 - - 12 -
YRJIL - 4 - 6 7 2 - 1 2 6 4 2 - - - -
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Sum - 4 235 245 57 222 174 4 2 6 157 254 175 183 201 123
Sirko Molau, 2001/04/06