Results of the AKM Video Meteor Network - May 2001 ================================================== After there was one negative record after the other in the previous months, the observers were finally awarded with better weather in May. In Germany we had stable high pressure systems both in the first and second part of the month resulting in blue skies and summer-like tempatures. Thus, active observers easily finished with more than 10 observing nights. Using also small cloud gaps I even managed to have only one break in the whole second part of May. What's missing is the night that we partly spend together with Rob McNaught in a Pizzeria in Darmstadt. However, that night was overcasted, anyway. :-) Steven Evans of England now started with "real observations", even though he could collect only a limited number of meteor records due to the short nights. Ilkka Yrjola observed his last meteor before the summer break at his high northern latitude, and our colleagues at the Canary islands observed up to 40 meteors a night thanks to the longer night time. There were an overall of more than 850 meteors recorded in Europe, which is far more than what we recorded that month in the last two years together. Rob McNaught spent most of the month in the US and Europe, but still managed to collect more than 20 observing nights. How's that possible? His colleague Steven Qirks operated the camera down under at that time! With the increasing duration of southern night the number of meteor records from Australia is still growing amazingly. Meanwhile this camera records more than the European systems during the Perseid maximum, and the tendency is still upward. It has to be noted, however, that the figures are still preliminary and might get down a little after another inspection of the data. In addition, the effective observing time of SSO1 contains also hours with overcasted skies. In the first part of May there was probably a minor shower active, which did not made it yet into the IMO meteor shower working list. The eta-Lyrids are currently under closer investigation in cooperation with visual observers from the DMS. By the end of May we were looking for meteors from comet Schwassmann- Wachmann 3, too. The video records revealed the same result as visual observations: There were virtually no meteors from the predicted radiant. Only Rob McNaught recorded about a dozen candidates. Given more than 300 meteors that night, however, these were probably by-chance alignments. 1. Observers ============ Code Name Place Camera FOV LM Nights Time Meteors --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BENOR Benitez S. Maspalomas TIMES4 (1.4/50) 20 dg 8 mag 6 42.1 h 120 EVAST Evans Little Thurlow EMILY (1.8/28) 36 dg 5 mag 5 14.4 h 27 KOSDE Koschny Noordwijkerhout ICC4 (0.85/25) 25 dg 6 mag 8 43.8 h 87 KNOAN Knoefel Duesseldorf VIDEOMET (0.75/50) 20 dg 7 mag 4 14.6 h 28 MCNRO McNaught Coonabarabran SSO1 (1.2/85) 13 dg 9 mag 21 191.4 h 3342 MOLSI Molau Aachen AVIS (2.0/35) 40 dg 5 mag 22 86.3 h 328 NITMI Nitschke Dresden VK1 (0.75/50) 20 dg 8 mag 5 22.6 h 36 RENJU Rendtel Marquardt CARMEN (1.8/28) 28 dg 5 mag 15 61.5 h 86 STRJO Strunk Leopoldshoehe FAMOS (2.0/28) 45 dg 5 mag 18 85.1 h 164 YRJIL Yrjola Kuusankoski NONAME (2.0/35) 35 dg 6 mag 1 2.1 h 1 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Overall 27 563.9 h 4219 2. Observing Times (h) ====================== May 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BENOR - - - - - - - - - 7.5 - 5.4 - - - EVAST - - - - - - - 2.0 - - 3.1 3.1 - - - KOSDE - - - - - - - - 4.6 6.0 5.8 6.0 - - - KNOAN - - - - - - - - 5.2 5.2 - - - - - MCNRO - 7.0 - - - - 8.9 11.1 10.9 10.9 10.5 10.7 11.0 11.1 7.2 MOLSI - - - - 0.7 - 1.9 4.1 6.5 6.5 2.4 5.8 - - - NITMI - 5.0 - - - - - - 5.1 - 5.0 - - - - RENJU 6.0 6.2 - - - - - 4.0 5.5 3.1 5.4 - - - - STRJO 5.3 6.4 - - - - - 5.2 5.6 5.5 5.3 5.4 5.3 - - YRJIL - - - - - - - 2.1 - - - - - - - -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum 11.3 24.6 - - 0.7 - 10.8 28.5 43.4 44.7 37.5 36.4 16.3 11.1 7.2 May 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BENOR - - - - - 8.0 7.5 8.0 - - - - - - 5.7 - EVAST - - - - - 3.1 3.1 - - - - - - - - - KOSDE - - - 5.8 5.7 6.0 3.9 - - - - - - - - - KNOAN - - - - - - - - - - - - 0.3 3.9 - - MCNRO 11.0 11.1 - 8.1 8.6 11.1 8.0 - - 2.0 - - - 10.5 10.9 10.8 MOLSI 1.8 4.8 - 4.9 5.4 5.8 5.8 5.7 5.4 3.1 3.6 2.7 0.8 5.1 2.5 1.0 NITMI - - - - - - 5.1 - - 2.4 - - - - - - RENJU - - - 4.9 3.8 0.9 4.8 4.8 4.3 4.2 1.7 - - 1.9 - - STRJO 4.4 - - 4.2 4.8 5.0 4.7 4.3 1.0 4.4 4.0 - - 4.3 - - YRJIL - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum 17.2 15.9 - 27.9 28.3 39.9 32.9 22.8 10.7 16.1 19.3 2.7 1.1 25.7 19.1 11.8 3. Results (Meteors) ==================== May 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BENOR - - - - - - - - - 41 - 15 - - - EVAST - - - - - - - 4 - - 5 6 - - - KOSDE - - - - - - - - 2 10 18 6 - - - KNOAN - - - - - - - - 7 7 - - - - - MCNRO - 147 - - - - 1 57 73 116 125 155 181 151 97 MOLSI - - - - 2 - 3 13 16 28 18 33 - - - NITMI - 3 - - - - - - 9 - 14 - - - - RENJU 3 7 - - - - - 5 7 3 10 - - - - STRJO 6 13 - - - - - 6 11 10 6 9 6 - - YRJIL - - - - - - - 1 - - - - - - - -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum 9 170 - - 2 - 4 86 125 215 196 224 187 151 97 May 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BENOR - - - - - 22 19 17 - - - - - - 6 - EVAST - - - - - 6 6 - - - - - - - - - KOSDE - - - 4 17 9 21 - - - - - - - - - KNOAN - - - - - - - - - - - - 4 10 - - MCNRO 189 256 - 111 208 168 180 - - 99 - - - 300 327 401 MOLSI 7 26 - 8 21 13 29 28 20 10 11 9 8 15 5 5 NITMI - - - - - - 5 - - 5 - - - - - - RENJU - - - 7 4 2 5 12 9 6 4 - - 2 - - STRJO 13 - - 5 22 11 15 10 2 5 7 - - 7 - - YRJIL - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sum 209 282 - 135 272 231 280 67 31 125 22 9 12 334 338 406 Sirko Molau, 2001/06/18