Taurid swarm years

2015 observations (SPA)
"Fireball Sightings" - Science@NASA feature by Dr Tony Phillips (2005)
2005 lunar Taurid
N. Ireland astronomy bulletin (note on reported fireballs), 2005 Nov 3
-10 mag fireball observed in 2008 Taurids (Majchrovic, Maruska & Piffl)
Paper describing Taurid swarm model (Asher & Izumi)
Analysis of 1985-2005 IMO Visual Meteor Data Base (Dubietis & Arlt)
Paper surveying 1962-2002 Taurid fireball activity (Beech, Hargrove & Brown)
Paper surveying 1988-2005 Taurid activity (Johannink & Miskotte)
International Meteor Organization
Armagh Observatory home page

The Taurid meteor shower occurs every year, when the Earth passes through the Taurid meteoroid complex, a huge stream of material orbiting in interplanetary space. There is a theory of a `resonant meteoroid swarm' within the Taurid Complex. Briefly, it predicts that in specific years, the Earth is hit by a greater number (than in average years) of meteoroids capable of producing Taurid fireballs.

The following table of swarm encounters predicted by the model was published in a paper by D.J. Asher & S.V.M. Clube (1993) Q. J. R. Astron. Soc. 34, 481-511 (the version below has 6 lines added, as the published version stopped at 2008 and 2009). Meteoroids are concentrated within 60-70 degrees in mean anomaly M (i.e. up to to 30 deg or so from the `resonance centre') with a gradual decrease over 10 deg or so at each end. Encounters are listed here for M within 40 deg of the centre. Calculations were based on the dates Nov 3 (pre-perihelion) and Jun 23 (post-perihelion); in fact, the swarm spans a week to each side of these dates (and the entire Taurid stream is even broader than the swarm). Negative Delta M means the swarm centre (resonance centre) is short of the Earth at the Jun or Nov date in question. Positive Delta M means the swarm centre is past the Earth.

The Earth passes through the Taurid stream in Jun/Jul and Oct/Nov but in Jun/Jul the meteors come from the daytime side of the Earth. Therefore it is Oct/Nov that is of interest to visual meteor watchers. The table shows that enhanced numbers of Taurid fireballs were predicted (at the very end of Oct and first week or two of Nov) in, for example, 1998 and 2005.

If you want data for years beyond the end of this published table, note that the numbers come close to repeating every 61 years. This is because the swarm orbital period happens to be close to 61/18 years. So after the Earth goes around the Sun 61 times, and the swarm 18 times, the relative configuration of Earth and swarm repeats. Example: there was a good swarm encounter in 1954; so there should be one in 2015.

Last revised: 2015 December 29th