The weekly newsletter for Fed2 by ibgames

EARTHDATE: December 13, 2009

Official News page 6


REAL LIFE NEWS: GEMINIDS METEORS PUT ON A SHOW TONIGHT

by Hazed

The Geminid meteor shower peaks tonight and tomorrow, and there should be ideal viewing conditions to see it. There's a new moon which means the skies will be dark, so that the meteors will show up brightly. At its peak, astronomers say, you should be able to see 140 meteors per hour. Maximum activity will be around 12:10am eastern (that's 05:20 UK time) but for many hours before that there should be some meteors visible, provided the skies are clear where you live.

That means I probably won't get to see them... the London forecast for Sunday night/Monday morning is cloudy with some rain. Typical.

The Geminids are pieces of debris from an object called 3200 Phaethon which was once THOUGHT to be an asteroid, but now considered an extinct comet - the rocky skeleton of a comet that lost its ice after coming too close to the sun. Earth runs into a stream of debris from this body every year, causing the meteor shower.

The Geminid shower has been growing in intensity every year, so researchers are waiting to see whether it will be even greater this year.

There's more information about the Geminids on this NASA webpage.

And here's a great picture taken during the Geminid shower two years ago.

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