Updated for 2011
Every year in early August, we can observe the Perseid meteor shower (“the Perseids”) and it’s a fascinating sky event. This year 2011, the Perseid peak activity is expected on Saturday August 13th 2011.
Unfortunately, there is a full Moon on the same day and this will make observing difficult (but not impossible, so don’t give in until next year!)
Here’s a beginners’ guide to the Perseid meteor shower and how best to enjoy it. (Perhaps, impress your friends with these astronomy questions and answers!)
What are the Perseids and what is a meteor?
Every year in August, the Earth passes through rock and dust fragments left behind by the comet Swift-Tuttle, last time it came near the Sun. As these small particles collide with the Earth’s atmosphere, they burn-up, often creating a startling streak of light across the sky.
You can easily observe this and it can be a wonderous spectacle.
Why is it called the Perseid meteor shower?
The term “Perseid”, refers to the star constellation of Perseus.
View of Perseid meteor radiant point, above NE horizon after midnight
The meteors actually have nothing to do with the stars we see from Earth, as being part of Perseus. It just appears as though the meteors originate from Perseus.
In fact, the rock fragments are close to the Earth – that’s why they burn in our atmosphere.
They are very close, just a few hundred miles – not many, many light years distant like the stars.
But, if you trace-back the bright trails of meteors we see, they appear to originate from the stars of Perseus.
When can you see them?
The Perseid meteor shower actually starts in late July and runs to late August. However, the best time to view is around the peak.
It’s not precise, but the 2011 peak is expected on August 13th.
The predicted peak hours are during the European night and morning (01.00 – 13.00 GMT). So if you are in the US, the peak may be better placed in your night, whereas for those in Asia and the East, the predicted peak will be during daytime, so you should observe the night before and after.
But having said that, there is always uncertainty in these meteor shower predictions, so it may be very worthwhile to observe during the hours of darkness and indeed, other nights, before and after the expected peak.
This year the Moon will be a problem, as mentioned already. Full Moon and meteor observing, are not best friends.
What equipment do you need to observe the meteor shower?
The good news is none! Just use your eyes.
It will help your observation if you give your eyes some time (say 15 minutes), to become adapted to the darkness.
Binoculars may also help, but on the other hand, they may restrict your view to a small part of the sky.
The meteors originate in the region of Perseus, but they may appear in view just about anywhere in the sky. Although, if you were to track-back their trails, you would get to Perseus.
Can they be measured, at all?
Yes. Keen astronomers count how many appear in a fixed period of time, in a certain area of the sky. This is expressed as a Zenithal Hourly Rate (ZHR).
We may expect around 100 streaks of meteor light across the sky per hour, at or near the shower peak.
Do please look-up and be alert for Perseid meteors, on Saturday 13th August during hours of darkness and in the nights before and after.
Best of observing luck!
I’ve just seen some meteors but I’m not sure which direction to look at this VERY moment. Any help? x
wow yow wow leeds wow hey me and my lil dauter seeen em wow quick yowwow wow so many cameras livley woooow plenty pics can u loyt see this damn
Seen about 10 meteors tonight from my house in Crawley, Sussex. Went out at about 2215 when I saw my first one. Spotted one approximately every 2 – 3 mins. So amazingly fast.
i live in south wales,
anybody know if the sky is cleaar?
i really hope it is, ;’]]
nice and clear in east sussex……..seen 1 bright one…fingers crossed!!!!
hi i live in lincolnshire wil i b able 2 c it
should be good never seen them before live in england, leeds
i stay in Malacca, Malaysia. Does anyone know the best time to watch the meteor shower?
im from malaysia, do anyone know where will normally be the best spot to watch this
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I’m so excited!
Never seen anything similar before. I live in South London in a very built up area any hints on where best to catch the spectacular event? Excuse my ignorance but wont the light of day/ city lights drown out the density of the showers lights? I mean visually for us?
Thank you!
unfortunately i do doubt you will see much at all in south london nicolita, although it will be worth a look just in case. you never know, if it is a clear night you may see something. just remmeber to look north east towards the perseus contelation
Got some rocks landed in parking lot in Hamilton Ont. not sure if its connedted to the storm pretty sure they are meteors, a couple landed near me and a couple landed on cars. Like a ping ping sound. I got one.
hihi…. i’m from malaysia. any idea that over here can see? which direction?
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Saw 2 earlier but has now clouded over . Live in East of England . Waited for years to see one as never seen before , BRILLIANT
hey!!
where should i go to watch them in London?
i though hamstead heath…
… but got a bit scared of being attacked!!
do you know of a place where many people will gather tomo night??
thanks, Lexy
if you just stand in your back garden/yard, you will see them just as good as i will. i always get a good viewing of these, even though i live in a built up area. If the sky is clear, you will see them.
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Saw 3 in the last 30 minutes. It’s starting to be good.
Caribbean!
Seen many meteors whilst in the hot tub tonight. Saw a very bright blue/green trail at around 02:15 GMT. Must be close to 60ZHR by now.
just saw three meteors …one very bright …11.30pm Swindon. 10th august …no sign of dark matter though!
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Just saw a meteor or shooting star in Wimbledon London UK
was it green?
I saw 10 meteors one with a white tail streak as it appeared to travel across the length of the garden
in blackpool lancs
Is Doc nuts??? 99.9 % of the time meteors do not drop on lawns, they burn up before entering the Earth’s atmosphere. As for your fireball story, they absolutely DO NOT travel 30 feet off the ground along roads. You say you don’t drink but I have a feeling drugs are involved
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Watching the sky last night (Saturday August 7) at midnight in South East England – it was a very clear night and observed over a dozen meteors in about half an hour.
We live in North Texas and have watched the showers for years. Where we moved to in the country must be ground O. Last year I watched the sky on the first night and saw little. The next night it did not take long and I found I was watching to high up. With in a hour I counted 6 that had to hit with-in a mile or less of us. So far this year the wife has almost been hit twice. One she thought was a bottle rocket and it was not. It hit the tree next to our front porch where we were sitting. That was this past January and there where so many leaves on the ground I never found it. Two days ago, right before dark another one came down in our front yard 10 feet away from where the wife was standing. I was there for both accuracies. I did not find the second either. It was more like a sliver of bright light instead of round ball or rock. We live out in the woods away from Dallas and this area seems to be ground O for impact. Used to I watched the sky, not I watch just over tree top high. The best one last August was a ball of fire the size of a softball and it was not more than 30 feet off the ground and going straight down our road in front of our house. I had never seen such. To pin point our location on a map would be 4 miles north of Poetry Texas. On no, I don’t drink. This is just to neat out hear.
7:35 pm MST Today.
I just saw a large meteor streak. Brighter than a helicopter. Streaking from West to North East over East Mesa near Phoenix. It broke up in many pieces. It was brighter than the police helicopter lights. It broke up in many pieces like firework it spread out. It lasted about 3 seconds total. It was close.
Ray in Mesa.
this is going to sound stupid but is it true were going to die in 2012 with a comet hitting the earth?
Flo – please don’t worry about this , it isn’t true. The story orginates from a rather feeble flim script supposedly based on truth , but it’s all made up to prey on people’s fears, and to amke money for the film makers of course!
On August 14 , I was in Dallas Texas hanging out with my brother and my husband…just talking outside in the balcony, when suddenly…this enormous flare of light almost like fire came out of nowhere in the sky, shaped as a comet…like a bright ball of fire or light or who knows followed by a tail the same color crossing from west to east and becoming smaller as it travelled, finally ending with 2 or 3 burnt ashes left behind and dimming themselves. This lasted for about 8 seconds…my brother was freaked out because of my stare!!! Eyes wide open, mouth half open…I was really amazed…I kicked him so he turned around and see what I was looking at. Size? waaaay bigger than an airplane….had the shape of a comet, and the size…hmmm..can’t really tell….if you hold a quarter with your thumb and index finger lift your arm straight and hold the coin level with your eyes in front of you…that’s about the size of the thing I saw…not that close of course, but that size far away in the sky…hhmmm..I hope I explained that correctly…anyways, it was incredible…never seen omething like that before…only in movies like Deep Impact…that kind of appearance but without stone seen…just light or fire….very bright!!
Wow Monica,
Great description. Think you saw a fireball! (I haven’t yet)
Check the American Meteor Society link just above.
Thanks,
Kevin
PS. Sorry, the AMS link was not “just above” (I’m shocked, but very pleased by the popularity of this blog post!) Here’s the AMS fireball reporting page. Thanks again.
Hi everyone,
Many thanks for your various replies regarding the UFOs. Its interesting to see how many people saw something similar.
I’ve had various suggestions for possible causes. One possibility seems to be Chinese Lanterns, released following a festival. These will float overhead following the wind, giving off an orange light. I have to admit that what I saw didn’t look quite right for this, and my wife has seen Chinese Lanterns before, and remembers them differently.
Neil and Wally in Guelph – could what you describe have been Chinese Lanterns?
Another possible explanation is that they are bits of military kit used to simulate missiles for training excercises.
I don’t think the ones we saw could have been any kind of satellite, due to their high apparent speed. To have crossed the sky that quickly and been high enough to be out of the atmosphere, they would have had to have been travelling well above escape velocity. Also, the East-West path over our latitude would not be the type of Great Circle that any orbiting object would follow.
Flo – your sighting sounds like it was moving much slower than ours, and could have been a satellite. I believe the International Space Station should have been visible, so that might be what you saw.
A colleague at work sent me a couple of links which may be of interest:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1190481/Mysterious-orange-UFOs-swoop-Britains-skies.html
http://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/news/Bright-orange-lights-in-sky.4287079.jp
All the best,
Paul.
hi everyone, does anyone know if i will see any perseids tonight? (17th august 2009)
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I was on a summer camp at RAF Henlow in England at this time. We all got our camp beds and watched all night. It was amazing. I made a wish for every shooting star i saw, that very night my wish came true !! Also, my friend was amazed as he saw orange lights appear which he said looked like a shooting star had blown into a satellite. I didnt see any but he saw quite a few unidetified orange lights accorss the sky
we saw about 30 in tow differant clusters. they were moving so slow and were a orange colour. we seen ashes falling about 100 feet away from us. we are in guelph ont.
I’m also in Guelph, ON! Neighbours on Alice St. pointed the lights out to me, there were about 15 of us in total that saw it.
We saw up to 7 at one time, all roughly to the north, perhaps 30 degrees above the horizon. All were moving roughly east, quite slowly. There seemed to be some minor movements to and fro. One or two of them just seemed to wink out.
Definitely not meteors, far brighter and larger than any satellite I’ve ever been aware of. None of us had ever seen anything like it.
Sorry that we have all hijacked the Perseid story’s comment section, but this is one of the stranger things that I’ve ever known, and I’m eager to see other folks who witnessed something similar.
sitting in Weybridge surrey, we saw about 30 to 40 of these, drifting across the nights sky.
The only difference was we did not notice any small iregular movements.
We were also out watching for meteror showers on the night of Aug 14/09 at 11:15pm in Nova Scotia. We saw the same thing that you have described. It was three lights in a triangle form moving very quickly, low, and absolutely no sound. Does anyone have an explanation of what this might be?
Hello all,
I hope you don’t mind me posting this query here, but I was wondering whether anyone else saw the odd thing (I hesitate to call it a UFO!) which my wife and I both saw while watching the Perseids last night?
Let me start by saying that we were both utterly sober and not under any kind of chemical influence (unless you count a cup of tea!). We compared notes after the event and had both seen exactly the same thing, so whatever the explanation, this object/effect was definitely visible in the night sky.
We were watching from South East Cheshire, England, and saw it around 22:20 BST (21:20 UTC). It appeared in Ursa Major and crossed the sky in a straight line almost directly overhead, travelling from West to East. It consisted of three dull orange lights, about the size and brightness of stars, in a slim triangle formation. The three lights made constant small random movements in relation to each other, while still maintaining their approximate formation. It’s apparent speed was two to three times that of an airliner at a few thousand feet (aircraft leaving Manchester airport regularly go over our house, which is why I use this comparison). There was no sound whatsoever.
The small random movements of the lights were one particularly strange aspect. The stars themselves were quite clear and steady, so I can’t put this down to atmospheric turbulence.
I have always been somewhat dubious about UFO sightings until yesterday, and I don’t blame you if you treat my report with scepticism, but I must repeat that my wife and I both saw exactly the same thing. Whether it was a solid object or an optical effect, it would have been visible to others.
So, I’m dying to know whether anyone else in the North West or West Midlands of England (or possibly further afield, depending on the object’s height) saw anything similar! Does anyone have any thoughts as to what it might have been?
All the best,
Paul Morris.
Congleton, Cheshire.
myself and my partner saw an orange object also last night(13/09/09) again in correspondence to your description it was indeed traveling at around 3 times the speed of an average airliner, it also travelled in a straight line across the sky directly overhead(we however are based in surrey) however the shape you desciped is differant to ours, we saw a shape not unsimilar to a large bird but this was aroud 1.30am and shining orange in the nights sky. i am very aware that satalites were visable as i saw at least 3 orbiting the sky as we wacthed for the phenominal shooting stars and none of these were orange they were all white lights that looked like very distant airliners. i would love to hear if you get any other responces from your qeustion.
They may have been LEO satellites which orbit in groups and rotate. I would search the internet on LEOs to get more info.
Hi paul, i am flo (aged 10) and I did an astronomy course a few months ago. please dont ignore this just because i am a child. anyway, if it looked like a slightly large star and it took about 2 minutes to cross the sky, and you said it went west to east, that could be the I.S.S. (Internatiol Space Station) but if it did not seem like a large star and went quicker or slower, it could be anything.
thakns
floxxx
hi paul, i’m from malaysia.. interesting story to read here, because i also experienced the same on 3rd october 2009 at 9pm (local time) in johor bahru (JB) capital city of johor (southern state near singapore) saw 5 bright orange objects slowly maneuvering the city’s sky.. i saw it with both my parents that night. at first 3 objects flying straight in line then changed it into a triangle. then there 2 objects came closely far behind. i didn’t bring any equipment to capture the scene because we’re in car going to shopping mall that night. some people say that these ufo sighting happened due to series of earthquake in indonesia (or any other mother’s nature destruction), i’m not sure about that but it may relevant because my friend also saw it on september 2009 before the earthquake and myself saw it after. too bad there are no evidence from me and no other people so far had an experience that night same with me.
as i’ve seen in youtube (type: orange ufo in searchbox) after the sighting, it look the same like i saw in the video and interestingly same all over the whole.
Are there going to be any comets/meteors tonight ?? If so what time??
Roger, There might be, but we are well after the activity peak now and activity will be tailing (!) off. Take a look when it’s dark and clear at your location. Best.
will we see anything tonight in south east london
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Hi will we be able to see it in South Africa?
http://www.bashewa.com/wxmeteor-showers.php?shower=Perseids
“Unfortunately the Perseids are not visible in Southern Africa as they are below the horison.”
Hi i live in devon near exeter and i wondered if i wil be able to see them there ?x x x xx x x
Hi
I think we saw a few on friday 14th at 10 pm from heavitree, to the west, fairly low and agaist cloud.they werent going fast buy seemed to quickly burn up.no tails seen.
hi,im in Malaysia now,can i still able to see any tonight?now we here is nights now..
i want to see the stars falling coZ i wanT To wiSh many times….hehehehehe
Anyone?
Hi will they be seen from Southern Spain?
hey iam in the uk down in the south near london could you tell me if i might see them or not and if i do what time. thank you xx
Im in london. At what time will i see them?
I live in county Laois in Ireland will i be able to see it and when?
estoy en COLOMBIA aqui aun no ha anochesido pero quiesiera saber si aqui puedo ver la lluvia de meteoros y cual es el mejor momento para verlos????
Hi, im in northern ireland… will i b able to see them and if so, what time?