At present the main island of Japan is suffering from the rainy days, but the rainy season ended in Okinawa, one of the southernmost islands, earlier and they are now enjoying the clear sky and the fine seeing in Okinawa. On 25 June, HIGA and ISHADOH at Naha, Okinawa became aware of a broad faint band starting from the northern inlet of Hesperia to its south. On 26 June KUMAMORI at Sakai, Osaka and MORITA at Hatsuka-ichi, Hiroshima succeeded in shooting by the ccd instruments the dust cloud. The preceding dust streak looked to have a linkage with a dusty area inside Hellas. On 27 June, KUMAMORI, AKUTSU and MORITA produced good images of the region and showed how far the dust prevailed. HIGA also continued to point his telescope to the surface by the use of a Video Camera. ISHADOH also watched the cloud every night and produced several drawings of the dust. We hear also MURAKAMI, ISHBASHI, NAKAGAMI and some others also observed the event. The started season was Ls=184 degrees, and slightly earlier than the case of the occurrence of the so-called great dust storms, and hence it may not so develop further, but may work as a precedent of the coming great dust season. Further Reports shall follow.
Dear Colleagues,
On 15 and 18 July, David MOORE at Arizona produced interesting images at LCM=340°W and at LCM=310°~315°W where a strange dark band is shown to run from the eastern part of S Sabaeus crossing Deucalionis R up to the east end of M Erythraeum. Since the western part of S Sabaeus is very faint as well as S Meridiani, this band appears as a new or pseudo S Sabaeus. This darkening must have been given rise to since the ground covered with dust has been swept away, and so it is of interest to continuously keep watch over the area.
We thus expected to catch the scene from the Orient, and finally last evening Syrtis Mj came into sight near the evening limb and surely the dark band was observed to run up to the east end of M Erythraeum from the eastern part of S Sabaeus. All the check was possible visually. The west end of the band looked really located at the east end of M Erythraeum, and this shadowy patch was already observed peeped out from the obscured disk on 20 and 21 July by our members who attended the CMO Meeting at Naha. On 22 June, the strange band was totally observed by the use of a 40 cm telescope chez Isao MIYAZAKI (at Gushikawa). Last evening on 23 July, the disk faced to us from LCM=341 degrees W at Naha, and so it was caught together with Syrtis Mj. At Naha it was possible to observed until LCM=054 degrees W, and at around LCM =010 degrees W, TSUNEMACHI detected Deuteronilus running eastward from Niliacus L by the use of a 25 cm Newtonian.
We are thus convinced that the deformed area will be chased repeatedly from our country from now on (just ended the rainy season in the main island) as well as from other Asia and Oceania countries.
We are going to include David MOORE's interesting reply in our LtE corner of the CMO soon. We so cite it here beforehand:
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Masatsugu:
Thank you for your kind remarks.
Thanks
Dave Moore
-----Original Message-----
>Dear David,
Finally we note that the dust covering is still globular, while the
north polar hood looks to be independent. It has been very active and
the brighter parts were very whitish. Furthermore some peripheral
parts showed festooneries, and some parts appeared to shine. So it is
necessary for any ccd images to be accompanied explicitly by the Blue
light images.
Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2001 10:55:43 -0700
From: "David M Moore"
To:
Yes there are some strange things going on in this region!
I was too tired last night to image, but will be out tonight, weather
permitting. Syrtis Major will be on the CM tonight, and that is
imaging Mars well past my CM. I fear this may be the last night for
me to image this area.
I will be using my still camera tonight as my USB port arrived. This
will allow for fast downloads. Hopefully it will give better results
than with video. If the seeing is poor, I will switch back to video.
It appears Don did miss the area. This is how it will present
itself to me tonight. Still, it shows the beauty of the Parker/Moore
combo. Don images earlier, plus there is a two hour time difference.
I image late when I get home from work. This gives us good coverage.
Others in between us, who are not as prolific of observers, fill in
when we can't.
From: Masatsugu MINAMI
To: davidpaulamoore@email.msn.com
Cc: whitbyu@erols.com
Date: Thursday, July 19, 2001 10:29 AM
Subject: RE:Mars - July 18, 2001
>
>Thank you so much for your recent images which are precious. I've
>gotten very interested in your images on 15 July and 18 July
>where almost all portion of Sinus Sabaeus has been washed out,
>and it looks as if Mare Serpentis moved to the west and Yaonis
>Regio has been widened. We may say a new dark band, a
>pseudo-S-Sabaeus, has appeared running from the eastern part of S
>Sabaeus crossing Deucalionis Regio up to the direction of Mare
>Erythraeum. Quite queer and interesting scenary! Do you think Don
>missed this scene since on 13 July he already captured Syrtis Mj
>near the CM? I hope you will chase this new dark band until our
>side will face to the region soon.
>
>With best wishes,
>
>Masatsugu MINAMI
>The CMO/OAA
-------------------------------
With best wishes,
Masatsugu MINAMI,
The CMO/OAA