Watch for meteors in late July and early August
Delta Aquarid meteors
(Credit: Steve Quirk's Frog Rock Observatory, Robert H. McNaught [SSO].)
Friday, July 25, 2008
The annual Delta Aquarid meteor shower rambles along steadily at this time of year.
This shower isn’t known for exhibiting a sharp peak, but it might be expected to produce the most meteors between midnight and dawn this weekend. That might be the case, if not for the moon.
The moon is up after midnight now. It’s bright enough to wash some Delta Aquarid meteors from view. And yet this time of year is known as peak meteor season for us in the northern hemisphere. Nights are warm and the Delta Aquarid shower combines with the famous August Perseid meteor shower to create the year’s best meteor displays.
So here’s your late July / early August meteor strategy for 2008. Wait. Wait until the moon is out of the way. By the last day or two of July – say, around midweek in the coming week – the waning moon will be rising so near dawn that you’ll have a window for dark-sky meteor-watching just after midnight.
Or wait until next weekend – the mornings of August 2 or 3 – when the moon will be gone and the Perseid meteor shower will begin rising to its peak. That peak will come on the morning of Tuesday, August 12. Then the moon will be up in the evening, but out of the way after midnight when the most meteors will be flying.
The ongoing Delta Aquarid shower isn’t as strong as the Perseids at its peak. In a dark sky, people in the southern hemisphere are likely to see 15 to 20 meteors per hour. Viewers at mid-northern latitudes might see around half that number.
Meteors in annual showers are named for the place in the sky from which they appear to radiate. The Delta Aquarids are named for the star Delta in the constellation Aquarius the Water Carrier. If you trace the paths of Delta Aquarid meteors backward, they appear to radiate from the vicinity of Delta Aquarii.
But you don’t need to know any particular star or constellation to watch a meteor shower. During these showers, meteors will shoot across the sky in long streaks.
cool and awesome
When stories say a meteor shower will peak on a certain day, does that mean that’s it until next year, or that they will taper off the way they built up?
Sue, meteor showers don’t all behave the same way. The Perseids build gradually (over weeks) and fall off rapidly (over days), for example. But, in general, most of the big annual showers – like the Perseids or Delta Aquaraids – do go on for several weeks at a time. During that time, there will be a morning that experts call a ‘peak’ – a time when the most meteors are expected. After that, the showers will taper off – some more rapidly than others.
Hope this helps! They really are somewhat different from each other, with each stream of meteors in space encountering Earth’s atmosphere at different angles, containing particles of varying compositions, and so on.
Sue,
Like Deborah says, meteor showers typically go on for several weeks at a time. According to Guy Ottowell’s 2008 Astronomical Calendar, the Delta Aquarid shower is active from July 12-August 19, and the Perseid shower is active from July 17-August 24. But in the beginning and waning days of these meteor showers, you might only see 1 or 2 shower meteors per hour – or perhaps even less than that! These meteor showers are best viewed for a few days, centering around their peaks. For the Delta Aquarid shower, that’s from about 1 o’clock in the morning till dawn on July 27, 28 & 29. For the Perseids, it’s after the moon sets on the mornings of August 11, 12 & 13.
Good luck!
Bruce
مرحبا بكم فى جوجل ايرس مع تحيات اسلام عمار
congratulation. and good job. but i think no life out the earth. just a gas. but anyway the man can use something to futuers from the gas to our life and best things.
and my wishes to you .
11 augsti 2008.