The Geminid meteor shower peaked on Dec. 13 – 14, 2012. At Ladd Observatory we operate an automated camera on the roof which takes an image of most of the sky every 10 seconds. There were many small meteors and a number of medium meteors that we captured during the night. Here are the four best images. Each is a 10 second exposure with a field of view of about 140 by 90 degrees. North is at right and west is at bottom.

There are some times during the year when a number of meteors can be seen in the sky. For example, the recent Quadrantid meteor shower during the early morning hours of January 4th. But late January is not usually a time that you would expect to see meteors. It is possible, though.

At the Ladd Observatory we’ve been testing a sky camera to watch for interesting phenomena in the night sky. The camera has a field of view of 90 by 140 degrees which can take an image of nearly the entire sky every 10 seconds.

Continue reading Watching the skies for meteors →

There is a digital camera in a weather proof box mounted on the roof of Ladd Observatory. The camera has a wide field (“fish eye”) lens that can take an image of nearly the entire sky. North is to the right, and east is at top.

Tonight is the Quadrantid meteor shower. The camera has been running for most of the night taking 10 second exposures.

The first image shows a spectacular meteor in the same part of the sky as the planet Mars which is the bright dot behind the meteor.

We recorded 12 bright meteors between 1am and dawn. There are probably also a number of very dim meteors in the images from this morning but I haven’t had a chance to count those. The meteors were mostly seen between 1:38 and 3:10 am EST which is when the shower peaked. However, one of the two brightest meteors was seen much later.