Tonight’s going to be a good night for meteors

The annual Perseid meteor shower peaks this week and tonight promises to be a good time to watch.

With a new moon (or very nearly) tonight, the skies should be nice and dark to see the meteors streaking across the sky — as many as 60 an hour, Science North staff scientist Bryen McGuire told NorthernLife.ca today.

“With a dark sky, this should be a great time to see it,” he said.

The Perseids originate with the comet Swift-Tuttle, the 130-year elliptical orbit of which last took it past the Earth in 1992. The tail of the comet is, of course, debris from the comet’s head, which is sheds as it traverses its orbit.

Every year at this time, the Earth’s orbit takes it through the debris field left in Swift-Tuttle’s wake, hence the annual meteor rain that falls in mid-August.

The comet takes its name from the constellation Perseus, however, from where it appears to originate (also known as the ‘radiant’) when you’re looking up at the sky during the shower.

Perseus can be a bit difficult to find if you’re not a sky-watcher, but most people can find the constellation Cassiopeia, which kind of looks like a ‘W’. If you can find Cassiopeia, just below it will be Perseus.

It isn’t really necessary to find the radiant though to see the meteor shower, McGuire said. The best thing to do, he said, is just look up.

“Wait until after midnight, go somewhere dark … then, just lie down and enjoy, just relax,” he said.

If you want to watch the shower and learn a little something about the universe in the process, why not attend a Star Party at Dynamic Earth?

There will be telescopes on hand to use and Bluecoats close by to answer any questions. Sounds like a good time and it’s free to attend.

The Star Party runs from 9-11:50 p.m. tonight (Aug. 12).

NorthernLife.ca wants photos! Planning on trying to capture images during the meteor shower? We’d love to see what you get and share them with our readers.

Send you Perseid meteor shower images to [email protected].

(Image used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported, 2.5 Generic, 2.0 Generic and 1.0 Generic license.)