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I went fishing in southern BC this weekend, and at dusk on Saturday I saw what looked like a big meteor or satellite burning up in the atmosphere, fireball and all. It was only visible for about a second or so before it dipped behind the mountains. Are there any websites or databases that record known meteor strikes? I'd like to find out exactly what it was I saw.
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Sep 14, 2009 02:22
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Loztblaz posted:http://www.amsmeteors.org/fireball/fireball_log2009.html is the only one that I know of, but it's maintained by amateurs, so it's by no means comprehensive. It doesn't seem to have the one you saw, but you can submit it if you want to: http://www.amsmeteors.org/index.html Thanks a lot, I went ahead and reported it. That site uses Venus as a brightness guide, and I saw Venus later that same night. This was definitely several times brighter, so who knows, it might actually be significant. Now I guess I've gotta go buy one of those Galileoscopes 
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Sep 14, 2009 04:50
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Well a friend and I took out my cheap-rear end Craigslist starter telescope for the first time a few nights back (well, the first time that the clouds didn't immediately roll in the second you look in the eyepiece,) and we had a lot of fun just looking around at anything we could identify, stars, planets, whatever. A question, though. The lens always starts to fog up, which of course makes it hard to see anything accurately, without a big fuzzy halo around it. It's at the time of year now when it gets right around freezing at night here, and I live in a pretty humid place so I figured the fog was just condensation forming when I bring the telescope outside from inside, but it doesn't seem to go away. Is there anything I can do to stop the lens from fogging up? Should I keep the telescope outside to minimize the temperature differential? If I do, are winter temperatures going to do any harm? Can I just periodically wipe down the lens with glass cleaner or something, or should I never touch it with anything ever? Right now I'm basically just dealing with it, which really limits the detail I can see. It's just a cheap-rear end Bushnell that I bought because it was local so I wouldn't have to pay triple the price in shipping from the states, so if I'm stuck with a foggy lens then oh well, but if I can fix it I'd like to know how.
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Oct 27, 2009 00:53
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Loztblaz posted:Keeping it at a similar temperature will cut down on dew, but it won't stop it totally. You can also make a dew shield out of cardboard and tape, just wrap it around the end of the lens and extend twice as far as the telescope aperture is wide. Both of these together will cut down on dew quite a bit. Thanks, I'll try keeping it outside and using the cardboard method next time and see how much it helps. Of course the next clear night is probably a month away since fall around Vancouver is pretty much constant rain.
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Oct 27, 2009 09:38
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