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Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Leonid Fireball

I took 99 exposures overnight from my light polluted back yard hoping to catch some bright Leonid meteors. In this frame taken over 2 minutes starting around 04:55:49 AM MST, a bright fireball flashed across the sky in the south part of Orion on the right side of this fisheye image of the night sky. Leo is on the left part of the frame (trace the image of the fireball back towards the left and you'll pass through Leo - hence the name of the meteor shower). It must have been spectacular to watch. I was asleep at the time as the camera kept its vigil outside with a timer remote faithfully exposing image after image. This image was taken with my 10mm fisheye lens with a 2 minute exposure at f/2.8, ISO 800.
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3 comments:

Unknown said...

Great stuff Jim. I setup an all sky video camera on my roof and captured the same fireball - haven't been able to process the video for the web yet.

Unknown said...

BTW - checking my records - the fireball occured at 11:54:12 UT - somewhat earlier than you say your image was obtained - have you checked the date and time setting on your camera lately?

NiteSkyGirl said...

WOW gorgeous photo !!!