Last night was the night before the peak of the Lyrids. The past 4 nights have seen a nice increase in the number of detected Lyrids from 1 to 2 to 3 to 5. Remember that even though only 5 Lyrids all night seems like a low number, your eye will see many more than my camera. My system can only detect meteor down to magnitude 2. Most people, even those who live in the suburbs or small cities can see fainter than this. Even from my home within Tucson proper, I can see 4th magnitude stars. Each increase in magnitude results in 2.1 times as many Lyrids (what meteor scientists call the population index). So if I were to have been sitting outside all night watching the Lyrids, I would have seen over 20 Lyrids. With tonight’s peak, hopefully many more will be seen.
Obs Date (UT) TotTime TOT SPO ANT PPU LYR ETA TUS 2009-04-21 09h 40m 9 4 0 0 5 0
TUS – Camera in Tucson operated by Carl Hergenrother
SDG – Camera in San Diego operated by Bob Lunsford
TotTime – Total amount of time each camera looked for meteors
TOT – Total number of meteors detected
SPO – Sporadics (meteors not affiliated with any particular meteor shower)
ANT – Antihelions
PPU – Pi Puppids
LYR – Lyrids
ETA – Eta Aquarids
The Transient Sky - Comets, Asteroids, Meteors 