by Tom Campbell
| Observer | Tom Campbell |
|---|---|
| Location | Iola, KS (Long: 95°24'W Lat: 37°55'N) |
| Sky Conditions | Clear |
| Seeing | Somewhat turbulent. There was heavy dew and aircraft vapor trails were visible for over an hour after forming. |
| Equipment | Naked-eye, reclining lawn chair, and blankets |
Although I've been an active observer for a few years now, this was the first time I stayed up to watch the peak of a meteor shower. I went to bed about 8:00pm CST Monday night and got a few hours sleep. I set the alarm to wake up at 11:00pm. After dressing warmly, I went outside in the hopes of catching a few Earthgrazers. I saw one about a minute before midnight. It was a beauty. It looked reddish-orange, but left a long, white trail. It came up from the horizon and right between Castor and Pollux. It reminded me of a rocket launch.
Then I went back to bed for a few hours and started my vigil again at 3:15am. I forgot to reset my count at 4:00a, but between 3:15am and 5:00am, I counted 232 Leonids (and one bright stray). Between 5:00am and 5:35am, I counted an additional 103. It looked to me like the peak came between about 4:30-4:45am.
Amongst the many Leonids, a few were memorable. A bright green one streaked through Ursa Major, a little brighter than Jupiter. It's trail was visible for several seconds afterward.
There were also a couple of what I call "strobers," meteors that flashed briefly and then were gone, with no trail or motion detected. One of them was near Leo, and may have actually been travelling straight towards me. The other one was well away from the radiant and was probably a small speck that disintegrated instantly.
While most of the meteors were white, there were several green ones and orange ones. At one point during the night, three orange meteors appeared from almost the exact same spot in the sky just a fraction of a second apart, and travelling in slightly different directions.
Peripheral vision was my best friend in sighting the meteors. I'm slightly near-sighted, but by removing my glasses, I had a greater field of view. For most of the night, I put Alpha Lyncis in the center of my sights. This allowed me to see a good degree of the quadrant of the sky northwest of Leo, including Gemini and Ursa Major.
The biggest surprise to me was the speed of the meteors. Some of them came and went so fast that they were almost like ghosts. By the time my eyes focused on the spot, nothing was visible except for the afterimage of the trail.
I had planned on watching the 2001 Leonid shower, but the weather wouldn't cooperate. I'm glad I had the opportunity to see their encore performance.