1. Fireballs... Reporting made easier

3. The challenge (1) Most people who see a fireball : Were not expecting it to appear Have no knowledge of the night sky

4. The challenge (2) How to get people to supply the required details without scaring them off by being too technical ? - Need to avoid using terms like azimuth, magnitude, UT, latitude/longitude

5. Who to report it to ? BAA Meteor Section SPA Meteor Section Armagh Fireballs page UKMON AMS BBC News Astronomy Now Sky at Night magazine Facebook Twitter

9. How to publish reports received? Some groups have web pages that quickly display received reports AMS website Armagh Fireballs page But its a lot of work to set up a system to quickly publish reports on-line Hence in many other cases, reports tend to languish hidden in email inboxes Fortunately, the IMO are offering help... http://fireballs.imo.net/?org=spa

10. Revised SPA Fireballs page

11. Fireball Report Form

12. No mention of latitude or longitude. I’ve found that the simplest way to start is to enter your post code The form then uses Google Maps to display an aerial view of your street...

14. No mention of Universal Time or Time Zones. You‘ve already told it your location. You now enter the local time And the form uses your location and the date to convert the local time to UT

18. No use of the word “azimuth” – works it out from where you click on the map

27. Magnitude range offered goes too high – encouraging witnesses to over-report it. Would be better to only show mag -4 to mag -14

30. 1 = No knowledge of night sky ; 5 = Regular observer Experienced observer can use the final box to describe the fireball’s path relative to constellations & bright stars

31. This is the Thank You message that the witness receives. Note the “SPA” logo in this example. As an incentive to encourage groups to make use of the new form, the IMO will create branded versions. - these will include the group’s logo, links to the group’s Twitter, Facebook and Home pages and most importantly....

32. ... emails of the full report (including the witness contact details) to one or more supplied email addresses

33. Pending reports – despite the “in a few hours” comment on the Thank You form, reports usually appear here almost immediately Click on symbol at LHS to view details of each report

34. Examples of reports grouped into events. Default is to show all countries, but easy to restrict to a single country Click on Event id to view a variety of maps

35. 2015 Apr 26 Fireball : Heat Map

36. What the new form gives us Provides an easy to use reporting tool Provides an on-line database accessible by anyone Less reports languishing in inboxes The SPA MS already has a branded form Do encourage people to use the form http://fireballs.imo.net/?org=spa

37. Fireball camera networks

38. Halloween fireball (Richard Fleet)

39. Trajectory

40. Don’t leave it to the cameras ! Cameras may be clouded/fogged out Cameras may be pointing in the “wrong” direction Cameras miss fireballs during twilight Add visual experience to reports

41. Why observe visually? Low cost, Low tech Meteors more impressive when seen visually Group watches can be a great social event (and help you to keep alert) Compare visual with images (a science bit) Compare current visual with old visual reports (more science)