Abstract: A summary of the activity of the CAMS-BeNeLux network during the month of August 2023 is presented. This month was good for 43080 multi-station meteors resulting in 12074 orbits.
Introduction
In August, of course, all attention goes to the Perseid meteor shower. Little moonlight this year during the maximum and in the post-maximum period offered potentially good conditions.
August 2023 statistics
The period without moonlight interference this year coincided with mostly good weather between August 8 and 24. Before and after, the weather was very unsettled. Like in July, also this month was very rainy, mostly in the form of rain showers. However, that did not prevent us from capturing meteors in every single night this month.
In terms of results, we found the worst nights at the beginning, and at the end of the month. On the night of August 2–3, 95 cameras captured only 99 meteors, resulting in three orbits. The night August 31 – September 1 wasn’t much better: 101 active cameras during this night, captured only 105 meteors, resulting in 8 orbits. But these nights were the exceptions. More than 100 orbits were recorded in 24 nights, a result nearly as good as in August 2022.
CAMS-BeNeLux recorded data of 43080 meteors from all stations this month, resulting in 12074 orbits. This is the second-best result for this month (Figure 1). Under cloudless circumstances in the whole of our region, as many as 2189 orbits were recorded during August 13–14. That is a new one-night-record since the start of our network in March 2012. Until now, December 12–13, 2022 with 1946 orbits was the most productive night. It is remarkable that, although it is possible to capture meteors during this night twice as long as in August, the number of orbits is even higher during this August night. Both nights had clear conditions in all parts of the BeNeLux. In my opinion, an explanation for this difference, is not only the slightly increased number of cameras available now.
On December 12–13 a waning moon, still 80% illuminated, was above the horizon in the constellation of Cancer for nearly the whole night. On August 13–14 there was no moonlight at all. One could wonder what the number of orbits could be during clear skies, and no moonlight, throughout the BeNeLux during a long winter night.
60.1% of all orbits were captured from more than two stations. A result compatible with the percentages during most of the last months.
Table 1 – Number of orbits and active cameras in the BeNeLux during the month of August in the period 2012–2023.
| Year | Nights | Orbits | Stations | Max. Cams | Min. Cams | Mean Cams |
| 2012 | 21 | 283 | 5 | 6 | 3.2 | |
| 2013 | 27 | 1960 | 13 | 25 | 15.3 | |
| 2014 | 28 | 2102 | 14 | 32 | 20.8 | |
| 2015 | 25 | 2821 | 15 | 45 | 30.4 | |
| 2016 | 30 | 5102 | 20 | 54 | 15 | 46.2 |
| 2017 | 28 | 8738 | 21 | 82 | 45 | 69.9 |
| 2018 | 30 | 5403 | 19 | 72 | 56 | 62.4 |
| 2019 | 29 | 9916 | 23 | 87 | 65 | 79.0 |
| 2020 | 31 | 8845 | 24 | 90 | 59 | 80.6 |
| 2021 | 29 | 7496 | 27 | 89 | 65 | 80.2 |
| 2022 | 31 | 14807 | 31 | 104 | 90 | 98.1 |
| 2023 | 31 | 12074 | 37 | 115 | 92 | 107.3 |
| Total | 340 | 79547 |
Figure 1 – Comparing August 2023 to previous months of August in the CAMS-BeNeLux history. The blue bars represent the number of orbits, the red bars the maximum number of cameras capturing in a single night, the green bars the average number of cameras capturing per night and the yellow bars the minimum number of cameras.
We could welcome two new stations this month. At Colombey-Les-Belles in France, Stéphane Barré contributes now to our network with his RMS-camera FR000F (CAMS -number 3907). From Alphen aan de Rijn in the Netherlands, Roel Gloudemans contributes now to our network with his RMS-camera NL000N (CAMS-number 3197). Both stations are a valuable addition to our network.
On average there were 107 cameras active on every night in August, which is a fairly high number, although some operators faced minor technical problems again. At least 92 cameras, and at most 115 cameras recorded meteors in every night (Figure 1).
Perseids
The huge number of data we could collect between July 29 and August 20 was used to look at the radiant drift of the Perseids during this time. Therefore, we used data from July 29–30 (313 orbits), August 4–5 (327 orbits), August 7–8 (522 orbits), August 9–10 (760 orbits), August 13–14 (2189 orbits) and August 19–20 (444 orbits). From these data, we used the D-criterium of Drummond to distillate the Perseids from this dataset. We found Δα = 1.31 degrees/day and Δδ = 0.28 degrees/day. Both values are in good agreement with the literature (Jenniskens, 2011; 2016a; 2016b).
Conclusion
Good conditions during most time of this month, resulted in the second-best score of orbits for this month.
Acknowledgement
Many thanks to all participants in the CAMS-BeNeLux network for their dedicated efforts. The CAMS-BeNeLux team was operated by the following volunteers during the month of August 2023:
Stéphane Barré (Colombey-Les-Belles, France, RMS 3907), Hans Betlem (Woold, Netherlands, Watec 3071, 3072, 3073, 3074, 3075, 3076, 3077 and 3078), Felix Bettonvil (Utrecht, Netherlands, Watec 376), Jean-Marie Biets (Wilderen, Belgium, Watec 379, 380 and 381), Ludger Boergerding (Holdorf, Germany, RMS 3801), Günther Boerjan (Assenede, Belgium, RMS 3823), Martin Breukers (Hengelo, Netherlands, Watec 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326 and 327, RMS 319, 328 and 329), Seppe Canonaco (Genk, RMS 3818 and 3819), Pierre de Ponthiere (Lesve, Belgium, RMS 3816 and 3826), Bart Dessoy (Zoersel, Belgium, Watec 397, 398, 804, 805, 806, 3888 and RMS 3827), Tammo Jan Dijkema (Dwingeloo, Netherlands, RMS 3199), Isabelle Ansseau, Jean-Paul Dumoulin, Dominique Guiot and Christian Wanlin (Grapfontaine, Belgium, Watec 815, RMS 3814 and 3817), Uwe Glässner (Langenfeld, Germany, RMS 3800), Roel Gloudemans (Alphen aan de Rijn, Netherlands, RMS 3197), Luc Gobin (Mechelen, Belgium, Watec 3890, 3891, 3892 and 3893), Tioga Gulon (Nancy, France, Watec 3900 and 3901), Robert Haas (Alphen aan de Rijn, Netherlands, Watec 3160, 3161, 3162, 3163, 3164, 3165, 3166 and 3167), Robert Haas (Texel, Netherlands, Watec 811 and 812), Kees Habraken (Kattendijke, Netherlands, RMS 3780, 3781, 3782 and 3783), Klaas Jobse (Oostkapelle, Netherlands, Watec 3030, 3031, 3032, 3033, 3034, 3035, 3036 and 3037), Carl Johannink (Gronau, Germany, Watec 3100, 3101, 3102), Reinhard Kühn (Flatzby, Germany, RMS 3802), Hervé Lamy (Dourbes, Belgium, Watec 394 and 395, RMS 3825 and 3841), Hervé Lamy (Humain, Belgium, RMS 3821 and 3828), Hervé Lamy (Ukkel, Belgium, Watec 393 and 817), Hartmut Leiting (Solingen, Germany, RMS 3806), Horst Meyerdierks (Osterholz-Scharmbeck, Germany, RMS 3807), Koen Miskotte (Ermelo, Netherlands, Watec 3051, 3052, 3053 and 3054), Pierre-Yves Péchart (Hagnicourt, France, RMS 3902, 3903, 3904 and 3905), Eduardo Fernandez del Peloso (Ludwigshafen, Germany, RMS 3805), Tim Polfliet (Gent, Belgium, Watec 396, RMS 3820 and 3840), Steve Rau (Oostende, Belgium, RMS 3822), Steve Rau (Zillebeke, Belgium, Watec 3850 and 3852, RMS 3851 and 3853), Paul and Adriana Roggemans (Mechelen, Belgium, RMS 3830 and 3831, Watec 3832, 3833, 3834, 3835, 3836 and 3837), Jim Rowe (Eastbourne, Great Britain, RMS 3829), Philippe Schaack (Roodt-sur-Syre, Luxemburg, RMS 3952), Hans Schremmer (Niederkruechten, Germany, Watec 803), Erwin van Ballegoij (Heesh, Netherlands Watec 3148 and 3149), Andy Washington (Clapton, England, RMS 3702).
References
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