Starship Asterisk*

Leonids Over Monument Valley

Explanation: There was a shower over Monument Valley -- but not water. Meteors. The featured image -- actually a composite of six exposures of about 30 seconds each -- was taken in 2001, a year when there was a very active Leonids shower. At that time, Earth was moving through a particularly dense swarm of sand-sized debris from Comet Tempel-Tuttle, so that meteor rates approached one visible streak per second. The meteors appear parallel because they all fall to Earth from the meteor shower radiant -- a point on the sky towards the constellation of the Lion (Leo). The yearly Leonids meteor shower peaks again this week. Although the Moon's glow should not obstruct the visibility of many meteors, this year's shower will peak with perhaps 15 meteors visible in an hour, a rate which is good but not expected to rival the 2001 Leonids. By the way -- how many meteors can you identify in the featured image?

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What I notice with these older images (and I have some of my own from the 1998-2001 Leonid storms) is just how bad film really was, and how much better meteor composites (and indeed, nearly all astronomical landscape images) are now that we're using electronic sensors.

I counted 30 individual meteors using the count tool in Photoshop.

I also counted 30 streaks

I see 31

Are the plumes related to the meteors?


I counted 30 streaks; could't find a 31st.

Case wrote:Are the plumes related to the meteors?

I think so.

Ann

35.

I was gonna say I saw a duckie and a horsie, but I changed my mind.

Case wrote:Are the plumes related to the meteors?t.

Yes, they are persistent trains, dust left behind the meteor. They glow due to sodium and iron chemistry (a type of airglow) and can last for several minutes. We typically see them become distorted by high altitude winds.

Sorry folks but I made it 32

31. But the sun isn't burning.

I agree with 31 plus a couple plumes.

I count 29

I could see all of them in that photo. They were really some small little one this go'round.. Who is in charge of rounding up the lot for next year (assuming I get the chance to see it)

I am seeing a message suggesting: "Your message contains too few characters." How many is appropriate when you only wish to make an obvious statement to answer a rather simple question???

I Believe it should be obvious that anyone sees everything they do... However, how they deal with what they saw and how they choose to record it in the place we have "discovered" in the place we remember what we do...

Still the red letters above still say - "Your message contains too few characters." how many is enough????

Perhaps this needs fixing?

AH!, there it is!

1

Supposedly the minimum number of characters is... 1. Mark just tested this before I could. It is possible for a bug to occur and for you to see that message, though. If you do, resubmit the form and it should work.

I found 32

I found 30

All of them!
Hardy Harr Harrr.