Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Observations Of Persistent Leonid Meteor Trails 2. Photometry And Numerical Modeling, C. A. Kruschwitz, M. C. Kelley, C. S. Gardner, G. Swenson, A. Z. Liu, X. Chu, J. D. Drummond, B. W. Grime, W. T. Armstrong, J. M. C. Plane, P. Jenniskens

Physical Sciences - Daytona Beach

During the 1998 Leonid meteor shower, multi-instrument observations of persistent meteor trains were made from the Starfire Optical Range on Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico, and from a secondary site in nearby Placitas, New Mexico. The University of Illinois Na resonance lidar measured the Na density and temperature in the trains, while various cameras captured images and videos of the trains, some of which were observed to persist for more than 30 min. The Na density measurements allow the contribution of Na airglow to the observed train luminescence to be quantified for the first time. To do this, persistent …