Leonids 2001 Meteor Gallery: Page 5
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Summary: Sky watchers who saw it will never forget it: the 2001 Leonid meteor storm. The display began on Sunday morning, Nov. 18th, when Earth glided into a dust cloud shed by comet Tempel-Tuttle in 1766. Thousands of meteors per hour rained over North America and Hawaii. Then, on Monday morning Nov. 19th (local time in Asia), it happened again: Earth entered a second cometary debris cloud from Tempel-Tuttle. Thousands more Leonids then fell over east Asian countries and Australia.

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All images below are copyrighted by the photographers.
Some of the videos in this collection appear in RealPlayer format.

  Photographer, Location Images Comments

Greg Quicke, Broome,
Western Australia
Nov. 18
#1 G. Quicke: "These Leonids are shooting right through the Southern Cross." Photo Details: 10 minute exposure on 200asa slide film with a 50mm lens piggybacked on a G8.

Michael Gill, Honshu, Japan
Nov. 17
#1 M. Gill: "I traveled from England to Japan for the meteor storm. This picture was taken at Satomi Village, Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan on November 17th/18th -- one night before the big storm. The full-sized version shows a single meteor trail passing behind the sails of the windmill at the mountaintop site."

George Varros, Mount Airy, MD, USA
Nov. 18
GIF animations: #1 (big),
#2 (small)
G. Varros: "A huge fireball imaged with 75 degree FOV Gen 2 intensifier. The meteor starts just above Jupiter, the bright object in the upper center of frame. More fireball videos at http://www.gvarros.com "

Kathie Pascual, the Pacific island of Guam
Nov. 18
#1 K. Pascual: "This meteor, which appeared through a hole in the clouds, left a 'smoke train' that glowed for several seconds." Photo Details: Yashica 35mm w/28mm lens using Kodak Max 400 film

Michael Vasseur and Pierre Martin, Spruce Knob, West Virginia, USA
Nov. 18
#1, #2, #3, #4 This pair of images shows the difference between long Leonid Earthgrazers (when Leo was low on the horizon) and shorter "ordinary Leonids" seen when the radiant was high in the sky. "For about an hour, I was recording an average of one impressive Leonid earthgrazer every 5 to 10 minutes," says Martin. "They appeared just like rockets coming straight up from the east. Many of them travelled lengths of up to 80 degrees accross the sky. This example shows the end-path of a red Leonid grazer bursting three times in the constellation Lepus."

Joe Fino, Rocks State Park in Bel Air, Maryland, USA
Nov. 18
#1 J. Fino: "I managed to capture two meteors in this 3 minute exposure. I used a Nikon 6006 with a 28 - 80mm Tamron Zoom set on 28mm. The film was Fujicolor Superia X-Tra 400."

John D. Sabia, somewhere in the USA
Nov. 18
#1, #2, #3 In this collection, Leonid debris trains appear near the handle of the Big Dipper.

John Pane, Laurel Mountain State Park, near Ligonier, PA, USA
Nov. 18
#1, more This image is merely the first of a series showing the development of a Leonid debris trail. See the full sequence at leonids.johnpane.com.

Janice Clark, Auburn, California, USA
Nov. 18
#1, #2 J. Clark: "I used a Canon AE-1 Program and Fujifilm Superia 800." The image with four meteors was a one minute exposure.

Debbie Kinloch, near Ft. Erie, Ontario, Canada
Nov. 18
#1, #2, #3, #4, #5, more Debbie Kinloch: "It was foggy over most of southern Ontario, but I found a clearing in the fog at 5 a.m. (1000 UT) - just in time to see the peak and snag a few pictures! Nikon FE on tripod, 15mm and 28mm lenses at f3.5, Fuji 800ASA, 15 seconds to 1 minute exposures. "

Tom Bakowski, Orchard Park, NY, USA
Nov. 18
#1, #2, #3 All these images show colorful meteors streaking through and around Orion. "Notice the debris at the bottom of photo #1 from an exploded meteoroid high in the atmosphere," says Bakowski.

Dirk Obudzinski, Mojave Desert, California, USA
Nov. 18
#1, #2, #3, more D. Obudzinski: "The Mojave Desert was a great place to watch the Leonids. We counted up to 60 meteors a minute. A few big ones lit up the sky in rainbow colors." Photo details: Nikon EM camera, 50mm lens, f/1.4, 10 to 20 sec. exposures on Kodak Royal Gold 400 film

Derek R. Overdahl, Harris, Minnesota, USA
Nov. 19
#1, #2 D. Overdahl: "This was an amazing event, one I will never forget! May next year be as good."

Anne-Louise Surma-Hawes, 300 km west of Brisbane, Australia
Nov. 19
#1 This 10 minute exposure shows Leo rising above Australia. Five Leonids can be seen emerging from the radiant; the black arrowheads help identify the fainter trails. Photo details: a Ricoh KR5 Super II, 35 mm f8 lens, Kodak TMax 400 film.

John Fast, Salem, CT, USA
Nov. 18
#1, #2, #3, #4 J. Fast: "My son and I observed several shadow-casting meteors, but were not fortunate enough to have them cross the camera's field of view." Nevertheless, these images of bright Leonids are beautiful!

More images (click on the name of the photographer to view the image):
Bill Fisher (the southern slope of Grandfather Mountain, off the Blue Ridge Parkway, USA); WD Greene (White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia); Ron Hinkle (Welcome, North Carolina); Charles Kiesel (Fort Branch, Indiana); Vilas M. Deshpande (Maharashtra, India); Anthony Arrigo (a campsite in southern Utah); Steve Houghton (Peace Vally Park in Doylestown, PA); Scott Wright (North Olmsted, Ohio); Alexandru Conu (Alexandria, Romania); Ken Sparks (Bradenton, Florida)

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