The structure of meteor streams associated with Comet Halley: Eta Aquarids and Orionids

Abstract

The association of Comet Halley with the Orionid and Eta Aquarid meteor streams is not commonly accepted at present. Southworth (1961) has determined the differences in the orbital elements of the Orionid stream and Comet Halley on the basis of 19 photographic meteors and found them to be rather large.Extensive observational material obtained since the beginning of this century, including a homogeneous series of the radar observations, carried out at the Springhill Meteor Observatory during the periods of the Orionid meteor shower activity in 1957–1967 has been used by the author (Hajduk 1971) to study the stream structure and its association with Comet Halley from a statistical point of view.The present analysis is an extension of the paper mentioned, based mainly on the radar observations of the Eta Aquarid meteor shower carried out at the Springhill Observatory during the period 1958–67. The total number of 240,000 radar meteor echoes observed in 670 hours between May 1 and May 10 during each of the years previously cited was used in this investigation. The observed variations in the hourly rates of echoes of different duration enable us to study the density distribution and size distribution of meteoric particles along and across the stream.