Gearing Up For The Geminid Meteor Shower! Let's Discuss When Things Ramp Up...
Meteor showers are probably one of my favorite night sky events. At the same time, these can be frustrating because it feels like many times you just look at dark sky. The Geminid meteor shower is one of our best late year events and will be ramping up over the next couple of weeks.
Geminid Meteor Shower
The Geminids will be ramping up on December 7th and peak Wednesday night / Thursday morning December 13 - 14! Most meteor showers come from comets, which spew ample meteoroids for a night of 'shooting stars.' The Geminids are different. The parent is not a comet but a weird rocky object named 3200 Phaethon that sheds very little dusty debris—not nearly enough to explain the Geminids. 3200 Phaethon was discovered in 1983 by NASA's IRAS satellite and promptly classified as an asteroid. What else could it be? It did not have a tail; its orbit intersected the main asteroid belt; and its colors strongly resembled that of other asteroids. Indeed, 3200 Phaethon resembles main belt asteroid Pallas so much, it might be a 5-kilometer chip off that 544 km block. Another part of the Geminids that makes it so intriguing is the raw number of meteors. Astronomers are calling for a peak of "up to 120 per hour"...
Image Credit: NASA
Geminids:
Comet of Origin: 3200 Phaethon
Radiant: constellation Gemini
Active: Dec. 7-16, 2017
Peak Activity: Dec. 13-14, 2017
Peak Activity Meteor Count: 120 meteors per hour
Meteor Velocity: 22 miles (35 kilometers) per second
-- Try to view the Geminids away from city lights. The city lights can make it much more difficult to see the streaking meteors. Inside the city, the bright lights may only allow you to see one or two meteors per hour.
-- Allow your eyes to adapt. Don't just go outside and expect to see a dazzling show. It normally takes about 20 minutes for your eyes to adapt to the low light.
-- This year we will have a waning crescent moon. This is important because it will mean the moon light will not spoil the show.
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The geminids are very beautiful and colorful. I am so excited to see this because it happening after 76 years later. Thanks for the update. https://goo.gl/FmVjJr
Posted by: Hazel Gomez | 12/12/2017 at 01:54 AM