Meteor Shower Report

Meteor near the Horizon

On Thursday, December 13 and running into the morning of December 14, eight hardy souls gathered at the Stone Barn to attend my workshop on photographing meteors and to enjoy the event.

When we arrived, the sky was clear as a bell with stars in the Milky Way twinkling above the stone barn and the surrounding environment.  I arrived early with my son and grandson to set up everything for the lecture part of the evening, and to prepare fresh hot Costa Rican coffee for everyone to enjoy.  After the lecture and setting everyone's camera up so that they would be able to try to capture the meteors, we all went outside with cheers and set up the tripod's in the cameras and started taking pictures.  We also were enjoying the spectacular show that was occurring.  They were meteors to the right of us, to the left of us, in front of us, behind us, and over us.

The question early was all the meteors we were seeing part of the Geminid meteor shower or where they, especially those that were in the extreme west part of the new meteor shower.  But, did it really matter.  The show was spectacular, we had at times double meteors in the sky.

The only thing bad that occurred was starting at around 12:30 AM, clouds started moving in from the north and finally obscured the sky right at the time when the highest peak of meteors was supposed to occur.  Oh well, we still saw a spectacular show.  Weather permitting, I will have a another workshop and viewing event in January 3, 4 - Quadrantids Meteor Shower. The Quadrantids are an above average shower, with up to 40 meteors per hour at their peak. The shower usually peaks on January 3 & 4, but some meteors can be visible from January 1 - 5. The near last quarter moon will hide many of the fainter meteors with its glare. Best viewing will be from a dark location after midnight. Look for meteors radiating from the constellation Bootes.  More information to follow, hope to see you.

Meteor in the clouds and fog

Geminid Meteor

Geminid Meteor