Abstract
A METEOR of unusual brilliancy was seen on the evening of Friday, the 23rd inst., from various parts of the kingdom. Mr. F. A. Buxton writing to us from Hertford states that he saw it two miles north of that town at 8.26 P.M. He says:—“I was attracted by its glare notwithstanding the moonlight, and saw it moving vertically downwards. I. could not accurately observe its path, but it passed, nearly or exactly, over a small star, just visible in the moonlight, which I think is π Herculis, and disappeared suddenly before it reached the horizon, in about N.P.D. 60 and R. A. 16.4O. By comparing notes with another observer (half a mile north of Hertford) it appears to have been visible much nearer the zenith than I had seen it; probably I saw the last 15° of its path. From the apparent slowness of its motion and complete absence of sound I gather that it was far off. My guess at the moment was fifty miles. In consequence of its brightness its apparent diameter was probably illusory. It attained two maxima of splendour, one about over the star named, the other at its disappearance. Scarcely any ‘trail’ was left; what there was almost immediately vanished.”
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The Meteor . Nature 17, 94–95 (1877). https://doi.org/10.1038/017094a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/017094a0