http://www.insidedenver.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_1467607,00.html
Students scan skies for great balls of fire Back-to-back meteors creating a thrill for amateur astronomers By Jim Erickson Rocky Mountain News October 9, 2002 High school science students across Colorado readied rooftop cameras on Tuesday, hoping to capture video images if another fireball streaks the night skies this week. A bright, multicolored fireball was seen in six states Sunday night. Two more streaking space rocks were reported in Colorado Monday night - one at 7:18 p.m. and another about 9 p.m., said physicist Chris L. Peterson, a member of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science meteorite investigation team. "I'm going to be out there, and my advice to anybody interested in watching meteors is to keep an eye on the sky," said Peterson, owner and operator of the Cloudbait Observatory west of Colorado Springs. In collaboration with schools across the state, the Denver museum is establishing a network of "all-sky cameras" to search for meteors nightly. One goal is to observe fireballs with several cameras simultaneously so researchers can pinpoint where meteorites hit the ground, Peterson said. About 10 of the video cameras have been delivered to Colorado schools, and three or four of them have been operational for several months, he said. Peterson contacted science teachers Tuesday and urged them to get the other cameras up and running. "I'm hoping that at least six or seven are running tonight and that all of them will be generating data by the end of this week or next week," he said Tuesday. Peterson's observatory and the Denver museum have received more than 600 witness reports about Sunday night's fireball, said Jack Murphy, the museum's curator of geology. Researchers used the reports to determine that Sunday's fireball probably exploded roughly 10 miles above western Colorado, near the Utah border north of Grand Junction and south of Rangely. Sunday's fireball may have been created by a rock as small as a baseball or a golf ball, he said. Murphy said the recent fireballs are unrelated to the Draconid meteor shower, an annual - and usually unimpressive - sky show that peaks tonight. Draconid meteors usually appear to come from the constellation Draco, which is currently high in the sky after sunset. But Peterson said all three of the recent fireballs appeared to move parallel to the ground, rather than streaking down from high in the sky. "That implies that the fireballs are not associated with the meteor shower," said University of Arizona meteorite expert David A. Kring. "The Draconids have also been, as of late, a fairly weak meteor shower. "So I would be surprised if it is part of that shower." ______________________________________________ Meteorite-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
