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© Copyright 1997 & 1998, Jim Loy
I just saw a very bright meteor, 12/3/97, 7:43 PM. I was just outside my door. It moved at about slow to medium speed, from East to West. Near the end, it broke up into five or more pieces which stayed together in a cluster. It was about 30 degrees above the Southern horizon, and angled down a little. The length of its path was about 50 to 60 degrees. It looked quite a bit brighter than Venus, which was very bright at the same time. I'm not sure of its exact path, because of the city lights, but I suppose it was somewhere near Pegasus.
I've seen quite a few meteors. Most were very fast streaks. One was very spectacular, moving fairly slowly from near the North Star to south of the celestial equator, changing brightness many times, and when it was gone I could see a faint trail of smoke. Another was slow, and exploded like a Fourth of July sky rocket, except that it was silent.
Meteors are mostly the debris from comets and asteroids. They are bits of rock (some as tiny as a grain of dust) which are flying around the Solar System until they run into the earth. They mostly burn up in the atmosphere, which is why we see them. When we see them, they are not way out in outer space. They are in our atmosphere, just a few miles up. Some land on the ground, and we call them meteorites.
Meteors tend to move much faster after midnight. Before midnight, we are on the side of the earth facing the direction that the earth has just come from. The meteors that we see then are mostly ones that are catching up with a speeding earth. After midnight, we are on the side of the earth facing toward where the earth is headed. And the earth is plowing into meteors, then.
Last night (12/11/97, about 11 PM), I saw another meteor, this one in Draco. It was just a fast streak, about 20 degrees long, straight down.
A few nights ago (10/21/98, 10:22 PM), I saw a very bright meteor. I was driving my car, East of Deer Lodge, facing East. The meteor moved, medium fast, from about 20 degrees above straight East, to the mountain tops South-East. I did not see the stars well enough to identify constellations. The meteor was of constant brightness, and seemed about as bright as a full moon would be.
Last night (9/12/99, 10:00 PM), I saw a very fast meteor, straight south, going straight down through Cassiopeia. It was fairly unimpressive compared to some that I have seen in the past. I get a great deal of pleasure out of even the least impressive meteors.