Email this article

Perseids' Meteor Shower

Get up early to see it

By Lewis McCool �2009

MOON PHASES

Full*: August 5, 6:55 p.m.

Last quarter: August 13, 12:55 p.m.

New: August 20, 4:02 a.m.

First quarter: August 27, 5:42 a.m.

*August’s full moon is perhaps most often called the “Sturgeon Moon.” I prefer the slightly less common name, the “Green Corn Moon."

IN HISTORY

Aug. 5, 1930 – Navy fighter pilot and Korean War vet Neil Alden Armstrong, was born in Wapokoneta, Ohio. Commander of Apollo 11, he was the first human to walk on the moon.

Aug. 7, 1959 – U.S. satellite Explorer 6 took the first photos of Earth from orbit.

Aug. 11, 1877 – U.S. Naval Observatory astronomer Asaph Hall, discovered Deimos, Mars’ outer moon. Six nights later, he discovered Mars’ larger moon, Phobos.

Aug. 25, 1989 – U.S. space probe Voyager 2 flies by Neptune.

August delivers the Perseids, the best known and most observed meteor shower. This year's peak is during the wee morning hours of the 12th.

Unfortunately, the waning gibbous moon rises a little before 11 p.m. on the 11th and will wash out the fainter meteors throughout the rest of the night. Dusk ends around 9:45 p.m., so there'll be an hour of darkness before moonrise. The brighter "shooting stars" will make the event worth a look even later in the night.

One of the best meteor showers I've seen was the Perseids' peak in 1980. Camped with a friend atop Blue Mesa near Gunnison, the sky was dark and crystal clear. I could almost touch the stars ? but that's another story.

We can thank Comet Swift-Tuttle for the shower. Every August, Earth encounters the debris left by the comet along its orbit. Most of the debris is in a narrow band that the Earth crosses in just a few hours (the peak). Lesser amounts of debris spread out for thousands of miles, so some Perseids can be seen as early as July 23 and as late as Aug. 22.

The comet was discovered in 1862, and by 1866, Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli had determined that the Perseid shower was linked to the comet. That was the first time a meteor shower was proved to be connected to a comet.

The shower's radiant point, in the constellation Perseus, is in the northeast after midnight.

Two of the solar system's giant planets, Jupiter and Neptune, reach opposition in August, Jupiter on the 14th and Neptune three days later. The two are about 3 degrees apart in Capricornus. Brilliant Jupiter (magnitude minus 2.8) will be easy to spot ? no optical assistance required. Neptune (magnitude 7.8), though, will require a scope. The bluish speck is northeast of Jupiter. Since the two planets are near opposition and their closest points to Earth this year, they rise around sunset, set around sunrise and can be seen in the southern sky around midnight.

During the nights of Aug. 2-5, Jupiter will be close to the 5.9-magnitude star 45 Capricorni, so close that the star will be easily confused with one of the planet's Galilean moons. It will be fun to watch the group's movements from night to night.

Saturn, another giant, is about to leave the evening sky and will be in conjunction with the sun in September. You can still view it through a telescope until late August. Sunset is about 8 p.m., and Saturn sets a bit more than an hour later. It's rings are nearly invisible (edge-on from our vantage point).

Mercury is hanging out in the same area, near the western horizon after sunset. See if you can spot the two planets and the 3-day-old crescent moon around 8:30 p.m. on Aug. 22.

Mars and Venus are low in the eastern sky before dawn. Venus is practically impossible to miss. Mars, on the other hand, will be a bit of a challenge. It's in Taurus, near Orion. Venus is in Gemini. Look for them around 5 a.m. Watch the waning crescent moon move through the area on the mornings of Aug. 15, 16 and 17.

Don't forget to enjoy the delightful deep space objects in Scorpius and Sagittarius while those constellations are well positioned in the southern sky after dark. A casual sweep with binoculars through that region will reveal several impressive star clusters and nebulae. You'll be looking in the general direction of the heart of our Milky Way home.

For a challenge, look higher in the Milky Way, in the constellation Vulpecula, for the Coathanger Cluster, also known as Brocchi's Cluster. Track down a good star chart and give it a try.