The Perseid meteor shower — which peaked last week — is one of the most dazzling celestial events of the year. Caused by debris left over from the comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle; the meteors streak across the sky— some in a blazing flash of light — before fading into the darkness. A spectacular sight, and one that I had the joy of sharing with many other observers from across the globe thanks to the first ever Twitter Meteorwatch.
During the run up to the annual maximum I spent a couple of mornings making visual observations as well as imaging with the DSLR. Due to the local light pollution, Moonlight and changing weather conditions the results were sketchy to say the least. Nevertheless I managed to catch a bright, but brief Perseid — about -1 magnitude — barreling south eastward from just under Perseus towards Pisces and Cetus. The camera also caught two faint Perseids which you can see below.
Perseid in Cassiopeia: Mouseover the image for more information.
Perseid in Perseus: Mouseover the image for more information.
When cloud cover made visual and photographic observation impossible, I utilised an ordinary FM radio receiver to listen to the ionized trails that the meteors were leaving in the atmosphere high above. This proved reasonably successful with six radio echoes identified over the course of an hour — buzzes, oscillations and distant radio chatter — above the hiss of the white noise.
Thankfully Stenhousemuir was furnished with cloudless skies from August 12th through to the early morning hours of August 13th — the best time to see the meteor shower from the United Kingdom. Between 01:09 - 02:19 a.m. BST I spotted eight Perseids, all with magnitudes ranging from -2 to -1. No doubt I could have perhaps seen more meteors had I the benefit of a much darker setting.
Regrettably the DSLR, which had being firing off 30 second exposures, did not capture anything more exciting than some fetching star trails. A photograph of a bold Perseid would have certainly made a striking prize, but when all is said and done I thoroughly enjoyed the chance to witness this thrilling meteoric display firsthand.