Big December Meteor Shower Tomorrow

I’m a little late with this… I usually try to give a “heads-up”, a week or two in advance.

Tomorrow, the night of Sunday 13th December to Monday 14th December is the peak of the Geminids meteor shower.

This is the annual shower of “shooting stars” that appear to emanate from the constellation of Gemini (however, they are NOT stars, just fragments of dust and rock debris burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere and they are also completely unrelated to the stars we describe as Gemini).

Nevertheless, the Geminids is a sky event well worth making an effort for. You MAY see a wonderful display of streaks of light across your sky, if you are blessed with dark and clear skies where you are.

The peak is expected around 5am UT (that’s the same as Greenwich Mean Time), but it should be worthwhile for you to look to the sky in the early hours at your local time. The Geminids is often a broad maximum, so you may be surprised. Anything around one meteor per minute, is very good!

Here is a sky map of where to look.

December Geminids Meteor Shower Radiant (click for larger image)

Best of luck.