Director: K. Horikawa, Secretary: Y. Iga
It has already been 10 years since the Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 (SL9) collided with Jupiter in 1994. This month, we have received observations listed below, unexpectedly much observations for last stage of the apparition, since we had fewer rain in this rainy season all over the country. Hatanaka is a new contributor to our section.
| Observer | Location | Telescope | Images/Drawings | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Einaga, Hideo | (Hyogo, Japan) | 25cm Refl. | 38 | images |
| Fukui, Hideto | (Kyoto, Japan) | 25cm Refl. | 25 | images |
| Hatanaka, Akitoshi | (Mie, Japan) | 40cm Refl. | 3 | images |
| Hirabayashi, Isamu | (Tokyo, Japan) | 25cm Refl. | 2 | images |
| Horikawa, Kuniaki | (Yokohama, Japan) | 16cm Refl. | 5 | drawings |
| Ikemura, Toshihiko | (Nagoya, Japan) | 31cm Refl. | 7 | images |
| Kumamori, Teruaki | (Osaka, Japan) | 60cm Refl. | 1 | image |
| Mishina, Toshiroh | (Yokohama, Japan) | 20cm Refl. | 4 | images |
| Miyazaki, Isao | (Okinawa, Japan) | 40cm Refl. | 15 | images |
| Yoneyama, Seiichi | (Yokohama, Japan) | 20cm Refl. | 1 | image |
| Yunoki, Kenkichi | (Osaka, Japan) | 20cm Refl. | 55 | images |
BA was passing the RS. It reached the f. end of RS late June, passing right south of RS about the middle July, and finally it was at about p. end of RS at the end of the month. BA was clearly seen as white oval during the passage, and RS did not show major changes, too. But STB somewhat faded about 30 deg. span of longitudes just following BA.
SEB was much disturbed by irregular white spots aligned on northern part of the belt, conspicuous bright one was seen on July 9 at II:20 deg. (Fukui). These spots made complicated of SEB aspect, because they aligned in SEB breaking up N. component which was strongly bluish in this apparition. The opening into EZ (SEBn rift) which triggered this activity was indistinct at about I:210 deg. It passed again north of RS about July 25, but Hirabayashi's image taken on July 26 showed it as merely fainter portion of SEBn.
In northern hemisphere, NEB seemed to be broadened at almost all longitude. It is expected that an array of dark barges and white spots will appear as next stage of NEB activity. But no sign of such markings has been observed, yet. NTB faded away all round the planet, remaining faint gray trace of the belt ranging from II:20 deg. to 90 deg. No sign of North Temperate Current-C had been reported, yet.
(August 6, K. Horikawa)