Astroblog: URGENT OBSERVATIONS REQUIRED - Possible New Meteor Stream

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

URGENT OBSERVATIONS REQUIRED - Possible New Meteor Stream

Posted on behalf of Adam Marsh, of the eastern Australian Meteor Network.

Over the last few nights i have been out watching the Delta
Pavonids. Only 3 hours of observing so far, and zero Delta Pav's seen.

However, with a total of only 20 meteors seen, I have noticed that 6 of
those have came from an area of RA 237 Dec -40 with a radiant size of
about 6 to 7 degrees.

6 out of 20 meteors from the one radiant defines this area, at first
glance, as a new and quite active meteor stream. There is nothing on
any list i have in relation to a meteor shower from this area at this
time. I have lists with several hundred meteor streams, and i seriously
can't find a match...!

All the meteors were of a medium-fast speed, were white and around + 2
to 4 magnitude. The closest radiant is the Alpha Scorpids (see below)
but the details don't match, alpha scorps are quite slow, and the Dec
position is all out. There is also the Alpha Lupids, but the RA is over
20 degrees off for this one.

a Scorpiids 246 -25 Mar 26 - Jun 4 Several Maxima Vel 35
kps Mag ave 2.5
a Lupids 217 -44 Mar 12 - 31 Mar 22

I will run this past the IMO over the coming days, but if we can get
some more observations on it, it would be fantastic. I would give the
stream a preliminary designation of "Gamma Lupids" at this stage, seeing
that is the closest bright star to the radiant position.

If we can get some more info, this would be a pretty cool new stream
discovery. If anyone does head out to make some observations, it would
be greatly appreciated. When listing the observations, list them as
"Gamma Lupids". Don't forward these ones to the IMO, i will correlate
the data and send a combined report on all the observers behalfs with
names, dates and all the usual stuff.

Data needed on the meteors are Magnitude, Colour, Train, Stream origin
and a rough estimate on the speed (fast, medium, slow) and med-fast or
med-slow if you feel confident enough. If we can get at least 10 hours
of observations, and a good ratio of "Gamma Lupids" vs "Sporadic"
meteors, hopefully we will have discovered a new meteor stream. Lets
see what happens......