From: Jure Ataju, St. Martin, France 
Date: Wed, 20 Nov 2002 00:31:49 +0100 (CET)


   The poor weather with a stationary area of low pressure situated over
Slovenia and much of neighbouring countries forced us to drive substantial
distances in search of clear skies. We started from Ljubljana around 11h UT and
after more than eight hours found first patches of clear skies near San Remo,
close to the Italian-French border. Following the advice from Werfried Kuneth,
who passed weather info to us by mobile phone we headed further to Nice and
then inland. We found crystal clear skies about 40 km inland, near the village
of St. Martin. We settled at a nearby ski resort, on top of a hill which
offered excellent horizon in every direction. There was also a cottage on top
and we could hide the Moon behind it. In short - I am most certain we couldn't
find better observing conditions.
        When we began our observations around 01:20 UT the Leonids were already
showing increased activity with 2-3 meteors per minute. It slowly increased to
about 4-5 per minute around 3h UT. The rise was fairly slow and when there were
still 'only' 5-6 per minute around 3:30 UT I began quietly questioning the
predictions. Then there was a sudden sharp increase in activity: 16/min at 3:45
UT, 24/min at 3:55 UT, 29/min at 4:05UT. The shower reached a definite storm-
strength peak at around 4:12 UT +/- 3 min with a top rate of 46 Leo/min and a
rate of over 40 per min centered on 5 min around that time. The meteors were
predominately faint with occasional bright ones and fireballs thrown in (last
year the 7-rev peak had, at least in my opinion, much brighter meteors).
Activity after the peak dropped off slowly  - 20 per min by 4:30 UT, 10 per
minute by 4:55 UT. When I stopped observing at 5:16 UT there were still 5 or
more Leonids per minute. LM was 5.7 - 5.9 throughout.
        There was a nice succession of fireballs through the night. We were
treated to a nice blue -3m sporadic fireball at 23:37. 50 minutes later a -5m
bluegreen Taurid fireball appeared in the northwest. An hour later, at 01:27 UT
a most brilliant -12m fragmenting Taurid fireball appeared overhead. It
produced a bright blue flash and then orange fragments. Among the Leonid
fireballs were a -10m bluegreen Leonid at 04:00:03 UT producing a green
persistent train that hung in the sky for over 9 minutes, then a -10m orange
Leonid at 05:49 near the northern horizon. We also saw two bright flashes, most
probably from bright Leonid fireballs at 06:02 and 06:05 UT. There were also
several brilliant -6m and -5m Leonid fireballs with long duration trains plus a
number of  -4m and -3m Leonids.
        I have done no analysis yet, only decoded the tapes and made meteor
totals for one minute periods around the peak. How does it compare with the 7-
rev peak from 2001? Last year definitely had more 'storm' feeling to it. There
was a continuous succession of meteors last year for about twenty minutes. This
year there were only periods of several tens of seconds with such successions
and then quiet periods inbetween. Meteors were fainter this year - while last
year an average Leonid was about +1m this year it was usually between +2m and
+3m. Also last year there were more fireballs. Not that this year specifically
lacked fireballs - there were quite a few, several very bright, but not as many
as last year. So while this peak was really an excellent shower/storm, I feel
that last year was more exciting (perhaps because it was my first storm?). Last
night I recorded a total of over 1700 Leonids in about 4h teff making it the
second most productive night of my life (last year beat it with 4100+ Leo in
5.5h teff).
        I need to get my data sorted now, get a good look at it and then I'll
be able to say more about this year's Leonids as seen from southeastern France.
It definitely was a storm and it definitely was exciting.