By John Merriam | 2022-08-04
On 08/04/2022 12:11 am by Garth Battista| Halcottsville, NY (Catskill Mountains)
Not a Perseid. This bright meteor burned over the Catskill Mountains last night just after midnight. We're nearing the peak of the famous Perseid meteor shower, but this isn't one of them. This shot looks north-northwest (you can see Polaris in the upper right); and Perseus at this hour was low in the northeast. I think this might be an Alpha Capricornid meteor. That radiant was nearly due south, but a straight line could be drawn from it to the meteor's path. The Alpha Capricornids peaked on July 31 so this may be an impressive straggler.
To get this shot I ran my camera all night long: 1100 frames over six hours. I got this plus two smaller meteors.
Sony a7iii
Sigma DC DN 16mm lens
f/1.4, ISO 1000, 20 seconds
Cropped and color adjusted in Lightroom