Podcaster: Dr. Al Grauer
Title: Travelers in the Night Eps. 529 & 530: Africano 4 & Cuban Meteorites
Organization: Travelers in The Night
Link : Travelers in the Night ; @Nmcanopus
Description: Today’s 2 topics:
- Brian Africano discovered his 4th comet in the constellation of Ursa Major with Schmidt telescope on Mt. Bigelow, Arizona.
- National Weather Service RADAR had picked up a large fireball meteor over Cuba.
Bio: Dr. Al Grauer is currently an observing member of the Catalina Sky Survey Team at the University of Arizona. This group has discovered nearly half of the Earth approaching objects known to exist. He received a PhD in Physics in 1971 and has been an observational Astronomer for 43 years. He retired as a University Professor after 39 years of interacting with students. He has conducted research projects using telescopes in Arizona, Chile, Australia, Hawaii, Louisiana, and Georgia with funding from NSF and NASA.
He is noted as Co-discoverer of comet P/2010 TO20 Linear-Grauer, Discoverer of comet C/2009 U5 Grauer and has asteroid 18871 Grauer named for him.
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Transcript:
529 – Africano 4
My Catalina Sky Survey Teammate Brian Africano discovered his 4th comet while asteroid hunting in the constellation of Ursa Major with our Schmidt telescope on Mt. Bigelow, Arizona. After Brian posted his discovery observations on the Near Earth Object Confirmation Page, it was observed by telescopes in Arizona, Slovokia, and England. Astronomers at these observatories measured the new object’s path in the sky and reported the details of its cometary appearance.
Scientists at the Minor Planet Center used these data to calculate the new comet’s path about the Sun and give it the name C/2019 B1 (Africano). Because Brian’s new comet has been observed for only short time, further observations will be required to make our knowledge of its path about the Sun more precise.
What we know so far is that Comet C/2019 B1 (Africano) orbits the Sun once every thousand years or so on a path which takes it from our neighborhood to two and a half times Pluto’s average distance from our star. C/2019 B1 (Africano) is likely to posses a nucleus of frozen gases several miles in diameter which contains material left over from the formation of our solar system billions of years ago. Observers with small telescopes equipped with electronic cameras are able to track Brian’s 4th comet as it comes to near the orbit of Mars before it retreats into the cold dark region of our solar system not to return until 3000 AD.
530 – Cuban Meteorites
On February 1, 2019 the National Weather Service tweeted that its RADAR had picked up a large fireball meteor over Cuba. At about the same time residents in Viñales, Cuba heard a loud explosion. One of them, Juan Alberto Pérez Pozo, published a YouTube video of the smoke trail left by the death of this celestial visitor.
So far, 19 observers on the ground have reported this event to the American Meteor Society. One of these eye witnesses, Scott Sutherland, was lucky enough to catch this meteor on his webcam at Ft. Myers, Florida. Amazingly Cruz Maria Ruiz photographed the fireball and smoke trail of the meteorite dropping fireball over Cuba from her airplane window while she was on her way from Orlando, FL to San Jose, Costa Rica on Spirit Airlines flight 923. Finally, pieces of this visitor from outer space were found by Fátima Rivera Amador. She shared her discovery by posting images of her meteorites on twitter.
Over the past 10 years the American Meteor Society has recorded 77 falls for which pieces of an observed fireball meteor have been subsequently found on the ground. If you see a fireball meteor report it to the American Meteor Society. Your observations will allow scientists to calculate the fireballs path through the atmosphere and be able to suggest where it might be possible to find pieces of it on the ground.
For Travelers in the Night this is Dr. Al Grauer
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365 Days of Astronomy
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