Cowardly Lion

There were plenty of stars in the pre-dawn hours of Saturday morning, November 17, 2012, but very few of them were falling. This image of the east sky, taken around 3:15 AM, shows only the quiet nature of prime time Leonids Meteor Shower. One of only two dim meteors I saw this night from about 3:00-5:00 AM missed this frame completely, streaking downward well above the three bright stars of Ursa Major (The Big Dipper) at upper left. Some sources touted this year's display as "being favorable for observers in North America," but this was a decided disappointment. I was left shivering in 30 degree F temps with no more meteors seen than on a normal night. This image looks east along Radio Road (right) in northeast Marion, Iowa, about .3-mile east of Highway 13. It is a 30 second exposure at f/3.5, 400 ISO and 18mm focal length. The constellation Leo (the Lion, from where the Leonids gets its name) is at upper right.