The Manastash Ridge Radar
Status Update
Chucai Zhou & Dawn M. Gidner
January 03, 2002
 
 

2001 Quadrantid Meteor Shower



From Space Weather News for January 2, 2003:

"The Quadrantids are named after Quadrans Muralis, a 19th century constellation no longer found in star atlases. The shower's radiant is in the modern constellation Bootes. Like the extinct constellation Quadrans Muralis, the cometary parent of the Quadrntid shower might also be long-dead. Astronomers have searched for a comet that shares the orbit of the Quadrantid debris stream, but found nothing. Perhaps it completely disintegrated long ago or remains undiscovered."
See http://www.spaceweather.com/meteors/quadrantids/quadrantids.html for more information on the Quadrantids.

The Manastash Ridge radar observed several meteors during the 2002 Quadrantid meteor shower over a period of several hours between about 8:00 am and 3:00 pm on January 3, 2002 (UT 1600 - 2300). As an extra bonus, notice that there are also several airplanes visible in some of the images.


 Movie: 1600UT - 1800UT

 Movie: 1800UT - 2000UT

 Movie: 2000UT - 2200UT

 Movie: 2200UT - 2300UT

Compare our distribution of observations with those of Stan Nelson from Roswell, NM, as shown on Space Weather News: