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July 27, 2021
by Jeff Renaud, University of Western Ontario
While billionaires compete in a space race that only a handful of the richest people in the world can take part in, a highly inclusive international project is looking the other way – towards Earth – and everyone is welcome.
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The Global Meteor Network (GMN) is led by Denis Vida of Western University and is a collection of more than 450 video meteor cameras hosted by amateur astronomers and professionals in 23 countries around the world.
That’s a lot of cameras and a lot more are on the way. The huge array, working collectively and connectively, is needed to reach GMN’s mission leader: to ensure that no unique space events such as rare meteor showers or meteor drop fireballs are missed.
« The main operational objective of the project is to establish a decentralized, scientific tool that observes the night sky every night of the year from so many locations around the world, ”said Vida, postdoc in the Department of Physics at Western, Western and Astronomy.
A new paper, soon to be published by Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society and currently available at arXiv, describes the project and shares some of GMN’s impressive preliminary results.
Meteorastronomers like Vida and Westerns Canada Research Chair in Planetary Small Bodies Peter Brown face a unique challenge in preserving their data. In contrast to other areas of astronomy, where the objects of interest such as planets or distant galaxies are usually so far away that they can be observed from virtually any point on earth, meteors appear much closer to earth and most of them burn up in the Atmosphere at altitudes of about 100 km.
« Other astronomers can pool their resources to build a large telescope on a mountain where the sky is dark and clear all year round, but meteorologists need spatial coverage above all else « said Vida.
A bright, meteorite-throwing fireball can occur anywhere in the world and can only be observed well from a distance of 300 km. In order to get the exact location of the fall and the orbit, it must be observed by at least two cameras in two different locations. This is exactly what GMN offers.
Just a few months ago, the Winchcombe meteorite made international headlines. Several GMN cameras in the UK tracked the fireball along with other meteor networks, resulting in important data retrievals and its eventual discovery on Earth. Inspired by the Winchcombe event, more than 150 meteorologists in Great Britain are now planning to install GMN cameras.
« There are already more than 100 in Great Britain, which is really exciting, » said Vida. “His role in the recovery and analysis of the Winchcombe meteor fall is positive evidence that GMN works.” GMN started when Vida was a student. The first system was installed at Western in 2017, and GMN has since grown steadily with cameras in Ontario, Quebec and Alberta, as well as the US, UK, Spain, Belgium, Croatia and Brazil.
“A few friends and I noticed that we can use inexpensive Raspberry Pi single-board computers and reduce the cost of a single meteor observation system ten times, so that we can install many more cameras than was previously possible, « said Vida.
Raspberry Pi Computers are considered the most popular single board systems and are often used in DIY projects or as an inexpensive system for learning to program.
In addition to the exciting imagery, GMN provides the meteorite community of the world with real-time awareness of the near-earth meteoroid environment by observing orbits of everyone Meteors from around the world released within 24 hours of being observed. The network also monitors meteor showers to better understand flight patterns and flow capacities, and even predict future events.
The location of all cameras and the latest data are available to everyone on the GMN website.
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