Fluctuations in the Activity Curve of the 2002 Leonids

Ruiz Herrera, Lola; Bellot Rubio, Luis R.; Serra-Ricart, Miquel
Referencia bibliográfica

Physical Properties and Morphology of Small Solar System Bodies, 25th meeting of the IAU, Joint Discussion 19, 23 July 2003, Sydney, Australia

Fecha de publicación:
0
2003
Número de autores
3
Número de autores del IAC
2
Número de citas
0
Número de citas referidas
0
Descripción
We present observations of the 2002 Leonid meteor shower taken with four intensified video cameras from Teide Observatory (Tenerife Spain) on November 19 2002. The cameras fitted with f/1.4 85 mm objectives were aimed at 6 deg above the horizon in order to monitor the largest atmospheric volume possible. The most sensitive camera detected 1300 meteors between 0312 and 0456 UT i.e. the period covering the European Leonid storm of 2002. The activity curve constructed from these data peaks at 0401 UT about 9 minutes earlier than indicated by the visual observations analyzed by the International Meteor Organization. Our results thus favor the model of Lyytinen and van Flandern who predicted the first maximum at 0402 UT. We find statistically significant oscillations in the activity curve. A Fourier analysis delivers a period of about 7 minutes. These observations confirm the discovery of Singer et al. (2000) that density fluctuations exist in the Leonid dust trails at spatial scales of 10000-30000 km. The oscillations we observe are very similar to those detected by Singer et al. the only difference being that the dust trail is 132 years older.