Meteor Shower Wednesday Night

[3113]

Full story here.

The Perseid meteor shower is set to light up the night sky at GTA and even far beyond. On August 13, the meteor shower will reach its peak as early in the morning. The annual event may just showcase a celestial offer to make up for what many hoped the northern lights would provide.

So if you happen to see the skies are clear on the night, the chances of a spectacular display of the Perseid meteor shower are very quite high. It was reported that Astronomers estimate that 60 or more meteors could be visible each hour following sunset on the 12th of August.

Whoo-hoo!

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Kinda early in the week for Usual Suspects.

 

[Guest]

. . . .

 

[JackLuis]

I saw the meteors about 15 years ago while camped in the high Sierras. With no city light the Milky way was bold as hell and the meteors, wow, lasted all night.

 

[fuckwaffle]

cool, if the clouds break maybe i'll stay up to watch.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

We'll be at the Hollywood Bowl watching BeBe King. I hope we can see them from there. Meteors, blues and roast chicken. Could it get better than that?

 

[jomar]

...

We've stayed up late a time or two to watch, no telescope necessary.

Did that with the kids a time or two...laying on our backs in a field in the middle of the night...making memories...

 

[trysail]

http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/pao/skyreport/images/perseids.jpg

 

[trysail]

http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/pao/skyreport/images/Sky_S_2010-08-15.jpg

 

[Guest]

. . . .

 

[trysail]

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/11/perseid-meteor-shower-under-way-peaks-thursday/


By: Tony Philips, Ph.D. ( Science at NASA )

Looking northeast around midnight on August 12th-13th. The red dot is the Perseid
radiant. Although Perseid meteors can appear in any part of the sky, all of their tails
will point back to the radiant:​

http://science.nasa.gov/media/medialibrary/2010/08/05/perseidmap_strip.jpg/image_full​

The Perseid meteor shower is caused by debris from Comet Swift-Tuttle. Every 133 years the huge comet swings through the inner solar system and leaves behind a trail of dust and gravel. When Earth passes through the debris, specks of comet-stuff hit the atmosphere at 140,000 mph and disintegrate in flashes of light. These meteors are called Perseids because they fly out of the constellation Perseus.

Swift-Tuttle’s debris zone is so wide, Earth spends weeks inside it. Indeed, we are in the outskirts now, and sky watchers are already reporting a trickle of late-night Perseids. The trickle could turn into a torrent between August 11th and 13th when Earth passes through the heart of the debris trail.

2010 is a good year for Perseids because the Moon won’t be up during the midnight-to-dawn hours of greatest activity. Lunar glare can wipe out a good meteor shower, but that won’t be the case this time.

 

[Handley_Page]

I don't know about the rest of the world, but in my part of the UK, it was a disaster for the last couple of nights. Heavy clouds obscured everything in the sky. Not a star to be seen (after it stopped raining for a while).
Boo bl00dy-Hoo

 

[oggbashan]

Sorry. I saw about six last night in quarter of an hour.

I went down onto the beach beyond the reach of the street lights.

Og

 

[djserani]

We went out last night to look, but couldn't see a thing.

 

[_Lynn_]

I saw three in half an hour. Not bad for the limited viewing area I had from my deck here in town.

 

[mynameisben]

I looked from my backyard for about 45 minutes last night, just past midnight. I saw one. Plus I saw six other non-shooters. That was pretty awesome.

 

[glynndah]

I saw quite a few, just about one every three minutes as one site was saying, including a very impressive one.

 

[trysail]

There has been a good view of three planets throughout the summer:

http://science.nasa.gov/media/medialibrary/2010/08/24/skymap.gif


​

 

[Handley_Page]

There has been a good view of three planets throughout the summer:

http://science.nasa.gov/media/medialibrary/2010/08/24/skymap.gif


​

What's the observation point ?.

 

[trysail]

What's the observation point ?.

You'd be amazed at how easy it is for we colonials to forget that London lies at ~52° N.

I suspect the original image was prepared for latitudes of roughly 38-40° N.

All descriptions that relate to your horizon or zenith — including the words up, down, right, and left — are written for the world's mid-northern latitudes. Descriptions that also depend on longitude (mainly Moon positions) are for North America. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) equals Universal Time (also known as UT, UTC, or GMT) minus 4 hours.

It is amazing how much the night sky changes with latitude. I'll never forget my first sight of The Southern Cross. It didn't cross my mind that it might be visible to an observer located at 5° N., but it was absolutely unmistakeable— there was nothing else it could have been.