The Sino-Dutch Leonid expedition 1998.
In case of a possible meteor storm on 18 november 1998 only observeble from Asia, meteor observers of the Dutch Meteor Society organized an expedition to the middle of nowhere in the Chinese province of Quinhai. There we stayed at the Quinhai Radio Observatory of PMO. The Quinhai radio observatory of the Purple Mountain Observatory is situated at the southern edge of the Gobi desert in a valley surrounded with mountains. The observatory lies 30 km west of the small town of Delingha (which is the nearest town...). So basic needs as power and water are made on location.
During the night 16/17 november the team of Dutch observers were surprised by an unexpected shower of Leonid fireballs. Many times the desert lit up under de flashing and exploding fireballs. Long persistent remnants (called trains) glows sometimes more than 20 minutes after the appearance of the fireball! Unfortunally I did not operate my Canon T70 and the 2.8/15 mm fish eye that night.
But my friends were able to catch very spectaculair pictures of this fireball shower (see http://delpsurf.www.cistron.nl/index1998.html ). The next night the fireball activity were almost gone. I set up my T70 with the 2.8/15 mm fish eye lens on a small wall and pointed them in northern direction with some landscape end the silhouet of the watertower on it. Some Leonids (fireballs) were captured and these pictures are presented here. Unfortunately we did not see a meteorstorm as expected. But at the predicted time we did see a maximum in activity. Not the expected 8000 but (only) 200 meteors an hour. But the fireball shower from the night before makes it more than good!
For a English report/story about this Leonid expedition and other Leonid expeditions in 1995 (Spain), 1996 (northwest France), 1997 (The Netherlands), 1999 (China), 1999 (Spain), 2000 (Portugal), 2001 (China), 2002 and 2003 (both Portugal) see my website :
http://www.koenmiskotte.nl/index

Pictures of the journey throught China you will find here : http://www.pbase.com/misko008/leonid_1998_expedition_to_china