SAASST News

Wednesday, 03 March 2021 08:02

A Very Low Monthly Meteor Activities for UAEMMN in February 2021

Meteor activity in February 2021 was relatively weak. The number of meteor observations by the UAE Meteor Monitoring Network reflected the low presence of meteors in the UAE sky. However, that alone was not the reason. Foggy skies and light sources disrupted the observation by the towers, especially in Al-Yahar. 

Consequently, the Sharjah tower observed 66 meteors, Al-Yahar 19 and Liwa 103. It is striking to see that Al-Yahar had a meager number of observations, even lower than Sharjah, mainly due to the light source right next to the tower. Moreover, the pattern showed fluctuation during the whole month, and Al-Yahar seems to have no meteor observations on several days. The towers’ observation yielded a total meteor count of 188 meteors.  

 

 

Comparison of Meteor Observations Over the Years

It can be noticed from the chart that the results in 2021 dropped remarkably due to the foggy skies and different light sourcing disturbing the observations. Throughout the three years, all towers seemed to be showing a decreasing behavior as a year passes by. In Sharjah, the total count did not differ much from 2020, but when compared to 2019, it was less by more than half. In Al-Yahar, the total count in 2019 was reduced by half in 2020, and in 2021 the count is significantly low. In Liwa, each year, the number decreases by almost half.