The Perseid Meteor Shower

syklops

tricky D wrote: »

Getting 1 every 1/2 minutes in Howth, good north facing spot in a dark area. One big flasher a while back.

So jealous!. I saw 3.

Might head somewhere a bit darker tomorrow night. To look North-East where I am is to look directly at the lights of Dublin City so I lost a lot of them. Spotted my 3 in the middle of the Plough.

ps200306

I've wandered south to Brittas Bay. What a difference! Milky Way is spread from horizon to horizon. Fabulous. And just saw three meteors with trains in a 20 second interval.

EDIT: Just back from spending an hour and a half down there until the sky started getting light. It hazed over once or twice but perseverance paid off. Counted five in a one minute interval on numerous occasions. In the darker sky you could see more meteor trains, although there weren't that many spectacularly bright ones. The seeing was really good a lot of the time. As well as meteors I saw the Andromeda galaxy with the naked eye and had my best ever binocular view of it... really had a sense of an extended disc instead of just a fuzzy blob. And that's with fairly poor night vision in general -- I can rarely make out individual Pleiades, but could see three tonight. Star fields in the Milky Way were amazing through binoculars and I even caught a meteor in the binocs by accident ... as well as a couple of satellites including an Iridium flare. Well rewarded, and best Perseids in a long time.

quad_red

Only came out at 4am - was I too late to see them?

Saw three in my first 2 mins (longest flash and tail I've ever seen on one) and was thinking yeah, I'm in luck here.

But not a banana since (almost 40 mins).

ps200306

I stopped watching at 4am. First tinges of dawn were appearing. I have watched Perseids right up till near dawn before, and they kept on going. Might be just luck of the draw. My best lot were around 3.30am.

liamtimdusty

First time going to a proper place with a dark sky last night.
Will upload some photographs later!

ThunderCat

ps200306 wrote: »

I've wandered south to Brittas Bay. What a difference! Milky Way is spread from horizon to horizon. Fabulous. And just saw three meteors with trains in a 20 second interval.

EDIT: Just back from spending an hour and a half down there until the sky started getting light. It hazed over once or twice but perseverance paid off. Counted five in a one minute interval on numerous occasions. In the darker sky you could see more meteor trains, although there weren't that many spectacularly bright ones. The seeing was really good a lot of the time. As well as meteors I saw the Andromeda galaxy with the naked eye and had my best ever binocular view of it... really had a sense of an extended disc instead of just a fuzzy blob. And that's with fairly poor night vision in general -- I can rarely make out individual Pleiades, but could see three tonight. Star fields in the Milky Way were amazing through binoculars and I even caught a meteor in the binocs by accident ... as well as a couple of satellites including an Iridium flare. Well rewarded, and best Perseids in a long time.

Out of interest PS200306, what binoculars were you using?

ps200306

ThunderCat wrote: »

Out of interest PS200306, what binoculars were you using?

A set of Bushnell 9 x 70s. I don't like them very much for night viewing -- they have an annoying internal reflection that shows e.g. a faint second Venus. My LIDL special offer 10 x 50s are at least as good, with a slightly sharper and brighter image.

JaMarcusHustle

Any point going out tonight?

ps200306

Weather forecast is for fairly wall to wall cloud, apart from some minor breaks on the east coast.

rolion

Thousands of mini meteorites in my area,escaping the dark grey everywhere clouds...looks like are organic in nature,very soft and in liquid forms,leaving a wet patch when in contact with Earth crusty protection... what can I do !?? Well,enjoying the rain !

tricky D

Just saw one after a minute's viewing, so might be worth going out depending on the quality of your viewing spot.

_Tombstone_

Nice night out really.

Trogdor

Definitely worth a look tonight as well, only popped out for about 10 minutes but saw some nice and bright ones my garden in bray despite the light pollution.

browner85

How many More nights will it last ?? Has it hit its peak yet ?

The Pheasant2

browner85 wrote: »

How many More nights will it last ?? Has it hit its peak yet ?

Open to correction but I believe it peaked the night of the 12th

_Tombstone_

browner85 wrote: »

How many More nights will it last ?? Has it hit its peak yet ?

The Pheasant2 wrote: »

Open to correction but I believe it peaked the night of the 12th

Yea theirs a pronounced peak the 11th/12th but it peaks till the 15th, it's an outburst year for it aswell which means theirs double the usual amount and it goes on until the 24th so yea, get out there.

Pretzill

_Tombstone_ wrote: »

Yea theirs a pronounced peak the 11th/12th but it peaks till the 15th, it's an outburst year for it aswell which means theirs double the usual amount and it goes on until the 24th so yea, get out there.

That's good to know - the cloud cover has been totally against us the last few nights in the Northwest - hopefully those clouds will lift soon -

Iancar29

Hi guys,

Heres my video from Thursday night down at Hook lighthouse

HD full screen to spot the vapour trails

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EweqyGqFnog

John mac

nicely done

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

Spotted one shooting star the entire weekend, but it was a beauty. Very long and prominent in the sky. Faint trails were beautiful. I was ill so I didn't stay up long and the moon was incredibly bright so that put a dampener on things

liamtimdusty

Fairly new to astrophotography - Couldn't get the camera to get focused so missed some huge meteors.
Eventually got a little bit of focus and caught these two.
Another thing I've never read about is the lens becoming wet with condensation!!

https://goo.gl/photos/ShhuPYw8V44znQ5Z8
https://goo.gl/photos/1eeHNq2gciUFqdfDA

quad_red

Iancar29 wrote: »

Hi guys,

Heres my video from Thursday night down at Hook lighthouse

HD full screen to spot the vapour trails

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EweqyGqFnog

Wow! The sequence around the 37 second mark is like going to light speed on the millennium falcon!