The Leonids are going Out with a Bang!

Image by George Varros NASA

Every year, the Leonid Meteor shower peaks around November 19th producing about twenty meteors per hour. But about every thirty three years, that hourly rate increases to hundreds per hour. The past several years watchers have been dazzled by the Leonids. This year will be your last chance to see them, and they are predicted to go out with a bang.

Meteor jargon is thus: The streak seen as the particle burns up in the atmosphere, is called a meteor. Especially brilliant, or exploding meteors are called bolides or fireballs. If there is anything left after the trip through the atmosphere and it strikes the ground, it is called a meteorite. And, finally, the chunk of rocky debris which causes the meteor, is called a meteoroid. However, it's really ok to just called them meteors!

Meteorites are old, very old, some maybe as old as the Solar System itself. They are much older than any rocks on Earth. Studying them can tell us things about the early Solar System and how the planets formed.

What may sound confusing is that meteors and meteorites seem to have different origins. Usually, on any clear night, in a dark sky, you can see about ten meteors per hour. But now and then, that hourly number increases to fifty or more per hour and we have a meteor shower.

On any clear, dark night, we can see several meteors per hour. These are random meteors and do not all appear in the same area of sky. Meteor showers occur about a dozen times per year and during these, we may see many times more, sometimes hundreds per hour.

Meteor showers are caused by debris from the orbits of comets which the Earth passes near or through. Most are small, from a grain of sand to a pebble in size. They enter the Earth's atmosphere and are heated from the friction of the atmosphere and burn up. Almost all are completely vapourized before they reach the surface.

The brightest meteors can be seen even from the city, but the darker your skies, the more meteors you will see. Try to keep away from street lights and outside house lights. For this years Leonids, the moon will be in the sky, but low in the west. If you can, use a hill or building to block the light.

You don't need binoculars or a telescope for meteor showers. In fact, using one would make you much less likely to see any meteors at all because using anything to magnify reduces the amount of sky you can see at one time. Rather, you want to let your eyes relax and not look in any one specific spot. Relaxed eyes will pick up any movement and you will spot a lot more meteors this way. If you have a lawn chair that reclines, use it as it will help keep your neck from getting stiff and make it easier to look at the night sky.

The Leonid meteor shower appears to originate from the area around the constellation Leo the lion. Leo is a spring constellation and does not rise till around 10:30PM in the eastern US. It moves to an almost overhead position when the meteor shower is expected to peak just before dawn.Leo is easy to recognize as the front stars look like a backwards question mark. The bright star Regulus is the bottom star in the question mark.

Astronomers have identified two debris laden clouds which the Earth will be passing through that should result in meteor storms of thousands of meteors per hour. The first one peaks about 11pm EST on November 18th; for the east coast of North America. The second one peaks six hours later at about 5:30am EST, favoring viewers throughout North America shortly before dawn. For additional information and sky charts, please visit http://starryskies.com/The_sky/events/meteors/

Constellations

The Solar System