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back to article Perseid meteors 'thrill star-gazers'

Last night's Perseid meteor shower wasn't quite the heavenly firework display the Daily Mail claims, but where conditions were favourable, hopeful skygazers were granted a few nice moments. El Reg's Iberian bureau took advantage of clear skies and agreeable temperatures to crack a few beers up in the mountains of Avila, and …

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  1. J 3
    Alien

    OK

    Here in VA, USA it was quite humid and cloudy, but fortunately most of the night was clear (until 3 am when the thick clouds and fog closed in and sent me back home. Condensation on the lenses and other stuff was brutal though, and several photos got a "dreamy look" that I'd rather not have. Not lucky with the photos -- saw several nice ones (manyl of them were not Perseids), but my camera was always doing an exposure AWAY from that at the time. Damn it. Only got a very faint one in a photo, over about 5 hours out there (a more lucky friend caught two). Saw at least two or three strong ones though, and some folks who were there in the woods for about the same time as me counted about 140 total.

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  2. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Damn the weather

    Am I ever going to see this legendary flock of winged horses ?

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  3. Jeremy 2
    Thumb Up

    A few...

    Spent half an hour flat on my back on the roof... Climbing ladders in the dark, middle of the night and after a few ciders probably wasn't all that bright of me but it seemed like the best place :)

    Clear skies, warm (nay, hot) temperatures in suburban Atlanta made it a little more comfortable than previous damp Perseid sighting endeavours in Britain :)

    Quite a bit of light pollution so I guess I only saw the brightest, certainly didn't see many but it's always a good sight when you do...

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  4. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Happy

    To my surprise

    It was a completely clear sky in Kent between midnight and 1am. As I was parked in a layby along a tiny road with narry a light or cloud in sight, I saw lots of the little buggers, but unfortunately, no really dramatic ones.

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  5. manky
    Badgers

    In Norway

    Getting pissed around a BBQ in the forests up in the middle of Norway - looked up when the conversation came round to the Perseids and immediately saw two massive streaks across the sky!!

    Watched from the comfort of my reclining Thermarest chair and saw loads more until the clouds came.

    Awesome! Never seen anything like that before!!

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  6. Ketlan
    Pint

    Blimey.

    "Not a good night for Perseid-watching here in the North West of Engerland last night."

    Here in very-damp Lancaster (at around 3.30am) I managed to spot five Percy's and a hedgehog in my garden. FROM my garden. A hedgehog IN my garden and a bunch of five Percy's observed doing their thing over about fifteen minutes FROM my garden.

    Bloody chilly, though. Thank God I was pissed.

    The hedgehog seemed to enjoy the display, too. :-)

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  7. heyrick Silver badge
    Happy

    Brittany calling

    Dry, clear, reasonable show. I wished upon a shooting star, then another, then another... eventually running out of things to wish for.

    It still counts if you go out in the middle of a meteor shower, right?

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  8. PT

    Probably not a Perseid..

    I saw a good one Tuesday, a few days ahead of schedule. It was traveling north to south, nearly horizontal, with a fat silver spark trail that covered about 30 degrees of sky. I figure it probably wasn't a meteor, since I didn't see anything like it last night. Probably one of those new-fangled satellite-killing satellites that were in the news recently coming back in from a polar orbit. Or perhaps it was a victim.

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  9. gimbal
    Coat

    Was going to try to catch a glimpse of any remnants, tonight - weather fail

    ...not being sure how large the Swift Tuttle debris cloud may be, in relation to the revolution of the earth, along the ecliptic, but being hopeful about it...

    To get a clear view, from where I'm at, I'd set out on a trail at one of the local lakes. The state parks dept has set up a scenic-vista platform, on one of the hilltops along the trail. It seemed that it might make for a decent vantage point, not accounting for the light pollution from the habitations and businesses of the city at the lake.

    I got about a mile down the trail, when the clouds rolled in, with accompanying thunder and lightning. It hasn't let loose much rain, so far, but it may as well.

    Oh the joys of apparently living under the jesttream.

    Mine's the one with the built-in hydration system.

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  10. StuBird
    Thumb Up

    WELL....

    Sorry to be a pain, but here at Portland in Dorset, we had clear skies, Milky Way was very visible overhead right to the horizon once the night vision kicked in, a great show of some very bright long lasting meteors overhead, sat in the deck chairs for a couple of hours...... sadly no photos, a little too inebriat.....innebdriad.....drunk at the time..!!!

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  11. David Pickering
    Thumb Up

    yay

    i saw some!

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  12. bugalugs
    Pint

    damn...

    15.4 mm of rain over 12-13th here in southern oz boondocks. we made tiny little paper planes, set fire to them and threw them about under the carport and thought about PARIS.

    got pissed. went to bed. same as last year. sigh...

    beer 'cos that's all there was.

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  13. cavac
    Thumb Up

    Got two on photo...

    ...probably some more. I still have to go through about 2000 images. Does anyone know an open source software for meteor detection in photos?

    http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=13817&id=100000892850346&l=6469c9b67e

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