From: Mark Donaghey, Chicago, Illinois, USA 
Date: Tue, 19 Nov 2002 09:51:40 -0600


  A last-minute change in the weather conditions here in Chicago made
 possible the observation of tonight's spectacular Leonid
 meteor shower or should I say "storm"?)!!
   Last year, I was astounded by the tremendous number of
 meteors I was able to see from my heavily light-polluted observation
 site at North Avenue Beach on Lake Michigan.  The viewing was hampered
 last year by a thin cloud cover that obscured all but the brightest meteors.
 Still, I was able to report: "I have never been able to see more than 4-10
 meteors during any shower since I've been observing from Chicago (since
 1994) but last night I was able to see a total of 89 meteors in 2 hours
 and 15 minutes!!!  Many people were disappointed in the display, but for
 me, seeing 89 meteors from this highly light-polluted site is absolutely
 phenomenal."
   Well, the weather this year threatened to prevent *any* observations
 at all, with moderate rain and heavy cloudcover persisting right up
 until 3 AM local time (09:00 UTC).  But at 3:15 I could see the full
 moon shining through the clouds and the NOAA ultraviolet satellite
 images showed that the clouds were rapidly moving away from
 the city, so I filled up a Thermos full of java and headed for the lake.
   I arrived at approximately 4:10 local time and immediately saw my
 first Leonids.  By this time the sky was very clear, (for Chicago) with
 all the major stars of the Big Dipper visible, 4 or 5 bright stars in
 Leo, and Jupiter looking gorgeous...so I grabbed a cup of coffee and
 stretched out on the sand and started to count.
   For the first half-hour or so, I estimate that I was seeing
 one meteor every 30 seconds.  The first one I saw was a very bright one
 streaking north through the Big Dipper (Ursa Major).  I could see meteors
 throughout the sky, some just above the horizon over the lake.  There
 were also some very faint meteors near the radiant in Leo, as well as
 some very bright meteors that appeared to be coming "head-on" to me
 right at the radiant.  There was one very bright head-on meteor that
 produced a clearly observable smoke trail that seemed to have a little
 twist in it, as if the meteor had "bounced" when it hit the atmosphere.
   Just as I was beginning to become disappointed that I was not seeing
 groups of simultaneous meteors (around 4:30 CST or 10:30 UTC), the
 numbers started to increase. This was a fairly rapid progression of more
 and more meteors between 10:30 and 11:10 UTC, with the peak occurring
 around 11:00.  At that time, I was seeing one meteor every 5 seconds,
 with periodic groupings of 3 or 4 at a time, all over the sky from the
 radiant down to the horizon, with most of them being nearest the
 radiant.  I'd say that near the peak, about 15% of the meteors I saw
 were very bright and produced beautiful smoke trails.
   Needless to say, my personal meteor observing record of 89, set just
 last year, was rapidly blown away! By approximately 11:00 UTC I had seen
 over 100 meteors! After 11:10 UTC, the numbers steadily dwindled as
 suddenly as they had increased, with rates down to about one every 30
 seconds again, but with occasional groupings of 3 or 4. It was a
 magnificent show!
   By 11:30 UTC the rising sun was beginning to seriously hamper
 observations from this site, and I bailed out at 11:40 UTC (5:40 AM
 CST)...but by that time I had seen an incredible 187 meteors!!  I'm sure
 that, if anything, I undercounted these, as I was only able to observe
 the sky from the zenith down to the eastern horizon, with the city
 lights west of me making observations in that direction very difficult.
 I also didn't count those I *thought* I saw very faintly in my extreme
 peripheral field of view.

   As if this wasn't an amazing enough night of stargazing, as I turned
 to head back home, I was greeted by a beautiful full moon setting over
 the city above the pedestrian bridge on Lake Shore Drive!
 What a night!
   To wrap up this too-long essay, I'd like to make three observations.
 1) For the second year in a row, I have been able to prove (to myself at
 least) that city observers would do well to ignore those who say that it
 is "impossible" to observe celestial phenomena from heavily
 light-polluted areas!  In the past year I have observed two major meteor
 showers and a stunningly bright auroral display right from North Avenue
 Beach in downtown Chicago!  So long as you do your homework by finding
 out in advance *when* and *where* to look, you will be amazed by what
 you can see!
 2) Judging by what I saw here in Chicago, I can only *imagine* what an
 amazing show this would have been from a truly prime dark-sky observing
 site!  This Leonid peak may well have produced a "storm-level" show for
 the lucky folks in the rural areas! I can't wait to read the reports
 from the lucky observers in the hinterlands!
 3) I am absolutely astounded by the incredible precision of the
 predictions made by the scientists this year of this morning's meteor
 shower!  It appears that they have refined their techniques
 for making predictions to the point where it is truly foolish to ignore their
 estimates!  Looking at NASA's website of the predictions for this
 morning's peak, it is amazing how well this correlates with my own visual 
 observations. When I came home and checked NASA's data, and saw this graph of
 predicted activity for an observer in Chicago, I was stunned.  Congratulations 
 to the scientific teams who produced these estimates!  Two years in a 
 row you have made it possible for me to observe these Leonids almost 
 as easily as tuning in to a scheduled TV show!