The 1999 apparition of the Leonid meteors is predicted to be
spectacular in the number of meteors visible per hour. The best
location to observe the "storm" component of the shower is
the Middle East. In addition, the Moon will also be bombarded by the
Leonid meteors; the impacts by larger meteors may even be visible with
amateur equipment.
The Wise Observatory
serves as the center of the ground observing
activities. During the two nights of the peak Leonid activity we are
planning spectroscopic observations with the 40" telescope where
the targets will be the airglow, the Sodium atmosphere expected to
develop around the Moon, and persistent trails from
very bright bolides.
On the terrace of the observatory we shall host a group of Canadian
observers who will operate intensified video cameras for real-time
meteor counts. These counts will be transmitted every 15 minutes to a
command center in the US where they will be combined with similar
counts from other sites around the globe. A "meteor activity index"
will be compiled and will be transmitted every 15 minutes to satellite
operators. The index will be used to determine operational means
(manoevers, switch-off, etc.) to protect the satellites from meteor
damage.
Next to the Canadian cameras we shall host at the Observatory a team
from the El-Op Electro-Optical Industries, Ltd.,
operating one or two infrared-imaging cameras. These will search for
the signature of warm dust particles left behind by disintegrating
meteors.
In the Observatory courtyard we will operate the Fast Photometer, to
monitor the changing sky brightness every second, and a panoramic video
camera (Xybion, similar to that to be flown on the Space Shuttle as
the MEIDEX experiment) to image the sky at 350 nm. The Extremely Low
Frequency monitor of
Dr. Colin Price
will search for bursts of radio emission associated
with a bright meteor passage. The Israel GPS network will search for
enhancements of electron density of the ionosphere because of the large
numbers of meteors.
A second group of Canadian observers will operate about 50-km
North of
Mizpe Ramon, at the Revivim Observatory near Kibbutz Revivim,
with similar intensified video cameras. They will also report
the meteor counts to the US center. Their observations, when
combined with those from the team in
Mizpe Ramon, will allow
triangulation of the video meteors and thus a determination of their
space trajectories.
Elsewhere in Israel a large phased-array radar manufactured by ELTA
will track the meteors.
The radar observations will be combined with those from the ground
teams and from the
NASA airplanes
to allow the construction of a
comprehensive picture of the meteor phenomenon.
The coordination of the Leonid activities in Israel is done by
Dr. Noah Brosch
with the help of the
Israel Space Agency
written by
Dr. Noah Brosch
