Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Perseids Start Tonight!



THEY ARE BACK! BIGGER AND BRIGHTER THAN EVER!!

THE PERSEIDS!!!

The Perseid meteor shower is about to peak. The show begins after sunset on Tuesday, August 11th, and continues until the sun rises on Wednesday, August 12th. A time of particular interest is 0800-0900 GMT (1-2 a.m. PDT) on the 12th. That's when Earth is expected to pass through a denser-than-usual filament of dust from Perseid parent Comet Swift-Tuttle. Forecasters are unsure what will happen, but some have speculated that meteor rates could surge as high as 200 per hour. Bright moonlight will blot out many of those Perseids, but even a fraction of 200 is a good show.

For the last 3 years I've had either dense cloud cover and/or thunderstorms. But the forcast for tonight is clear (keeping my fingers crossed). So I hope to have good "seeing".

You can find out more about the Perseids at Space Weather or at NASA.

Enjoy the show tonight. It is suppose to be the best one ever!

1 comment:

auntybrat said...

I have been closely watching the grey clouds we have here - hoping they clear before this tonight. I want to see this....

Will be posting and linking to you. Thank you..