Meteor Showers

[RenaissanceLady]

Assuming it's not dumping snow where you live...

Tonight should be a good night for viewing the South Taurids meteor shower. Though neither the South Taurids nor North Taurids produce many meteors-per-hour, they tend to be brighter than other meteors and have a high percentage of fireballs. A thin waxing crescent moon will set early, which means we will have a darker night for better viewing. Peak viewing times should be from midnight until dawn. Expect to see around 7 meteors per hour.

If you're unable to catch tonight's viewing, there will be other meteor showers in the near future. These are what we can expect for the rest of 2013:

November 11th-12th. North Taurids Meteor Shower:
Along with the South Taurids, the North Taurids is a long-lasting but modest meteor shower. Again, peak viewing will be between midnight and dawn, with maximum of around 7 meteors per hour. A bright moon may hide most of the meteors, but the moon will set around midnight.

November 16th-17th. The Leonids Meteor Shower:
This has produced some of the greatest meteor showers in recent history. Other times, it simply fizzles. One time, in 1966, it produced thousands of meteors per minute during a 15-minute span. Usually, it produces around 10-15 meteors per hour. A bright full moon will interfere with viewing this year, though peak viewing times will still happen just before dawn.

December 13th-14th, the Geminids Meteor Shower:
This is usually considered to be among the finest meteor showers. During its peak, 50-100 meteors per hour are visible. They're also usually bright enough to be seen even with a bright moon in the sky. Still, a bright waxing gibbeous moon will interfere with the viewing this year, so the best viewing times will be from the time the moon sets until dawn.

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Tonight, at my location, it will most likely be dumping snow, so it's doubtful I'll be able to view the South Taurids meteor shower. I'm hoping the rest of you will have a good show. I'd love to hear about it.

 

[Burnt State]

I have this quintessential moment in my life back in the mid-90's that includes watching a summer meteor shower across multiple nights. While camping deep in a northern bush with my brother, far away from people, i remember quietly canoeing on the lake at night under a star fretted canopy while it bursted with streaks of light every other moment, some scratching deep lines of light across whole chunks of constellations. The only other sound was the disquieting and mangled calls of loons careening over the water. They haunted us night after night. Lying on the glacier scraped shelf of stone that formed our island camping spot, my body half in the warm lake water and head on dry stone still warm from the day, I never tired of watching anomalous pebbles racing to their burning deaths as they kissed the edges of our atmosphere. That week camping, forgetting entirely about civilization, while the sky danced and blazed every night, was about as close to real magic I've ever been.

Thanks for sparking that memory.

 

[stonehart]

I have this quintessential moment in my life back in the mid-90's that includes watching a summer meteor shower across multiple nights. While camping deep in a northern bush with my brother, far away from people, i remember quietly canoeing on the lake at night under a star fretted canopy while it bursted with streaks of light every other moment, some scratching deep lines of light across whole chunks of constellations. The only other sound was the disquieting and mangled calls of loons careening over the water. They haunted us night after night. Lying on the glacier scraped shelf of stone that formed our island camping spot, my body half in the warm lake water and head on dry stone still warm from the day, I never tired of watching anomalous pebbles racing to their burning deaths as they kissed the edges of our atmosphere. That week camping, forgetting entirely about civilization, while the sky danced and blazed every night, was about as close to real magic I've ever been.

Thanks for sparking that memory.

Poetry

 

[RenaissanceLady]

I have this quintessential moment in my life back in the mid-90's that includes watching a summer meteor shower across multiple nights. While camping deep in a northern bush with my brother, far away from people, i remember quietly canoeing on the lake at night under a star fretted canopy while it bursted with streaks of light every other moment, some scratching deep lines of light across whole chunks of constellations. The only other sound was the disquieting and mangled calls of loons careening over the water. They haunted us night after night. Lying on the glacier scraped shelf of stone that formed our island camping spot, my body half in the warm lake water and head on dry stone still warm from the day, I never tired of watching anomalous pebbles racing to their burning deaths as they kissed the edges of our atmosphere. That week camping, forgetting entirely about civilization, while the sky danced and blazed every night, was about as close to real magic I've ever been.

Thanks for sparking that memory.

That was absolutely beautiful and I cannot express how much I loved reading this.

There are times it is brutally hard living in the rural mountains. There are also times when I am greatly rewarded with being here. Clear, dark nights are frequent, so I can see the starry skies most could only imagine. There have been numerous times I've been outside after dark and have seen a shooting star or fireball, directly in my line of site. One was so intense that it caused me to drop my groceries in the snow when it happened. There are few things that leave me as overwhelmed as contemplating how long and how far a meteor must have traveled before it ended its journey in our atmosphere. I'm grateful for those moments.

These dark, clear nights also indicate that we usually have spectacular views of meteor showers. Several years ago, a Geminid meteor shower left me grabbing for the deck rail. It was so cold, dark, and quiet, and the meteor shower was so brilliant, that I felt as if I were the only person in the world who was witnessing it. I felt entirely alone, which was both frightening and thrilling, leaving me almost weak from it. It was a magical moment, when nothing else in the world felt relevant. A perfect escape from the mundane.

 

[pixelsmith]

The best meteor I ever witnessed was over my house in 1987. It was exactly like passing across your line of sight about 6 lit sparklers at arms length complete with sparkles. Never have I seen another one so close.

 

[Burnt State]

That was absolutely beautiful and I cannot express how much I loved reading this.

Such moments deserve some good vocabulary. Glad you enjoyed it. Payback for all the many laughs you've given me on the official funny stuff thread.

There are times it is brutally hard living in the rural mountains. There are also times when I am greatly rewarded with being here. Clear, dark nights are frequent, so I can see the starry skies most could only imagine. There have been numerous times I've been outside after dark and have seen a shooting star or fireball, directly in my line of site. One was so intense that it caused me to drop my groceries in the snow when it happened. There are few things that leave me as overwhelmed as contemplating how long and how far a meteor must have traveled before it ended its journey in our atmosphere. I'm grateful for those moments.

You are one lucky cat to have those kind of visuals frequently. I get under 100 stars and some planets on clear nights - that's it. That's truly mundane up against minimal light pollution.

You reminded me about some lines from one of my favourite poets, Anne Michaels, who references the sky quite often. She reminds me that when we look up, we look into the past, seeing light whose source is long gone. Those stars who last forever for us, are still ephemeral like us, whose bodies are made up of the same stuff that stars are. You would like her work. Consider checking out her two volume text, The Weight of Oranges/Miner's Pond. Totally stunning words and moving themes that swallows up history, family, art, lovers, nature, science, geology and those unseen formations that shift and change inside us and out.

From "What the Light Teaches"...

"Language is the house with lamplight in its windows,
visible across fields. Approaching, you can hear
music; closer, smell
soup, bay leaves, bread — a meal for anyone
who has only his tongue left.
It’s a country; home, family; abandoned, burned down; whole lines dead, unmarried.
For those who can’t read their way in the streets,
or in the gestures and faces of strangers,
language is the house to run to;
in wild nights, chased by dogs and other sounds,
when you’ve been lost a long time,
when you have no other place.

There are nights in the forest of words
when I panic, every step into thicker darkness,
the only way out to write myself into a clearing,
which is silence.
Nights in the forest of words
when I’m afraid we won’t hear each other
over clattering branches, over
both our voices calling.

In winter, in the hour
when the sun runs liquid then freezes,
caught in the mantilla of empty trees;
when my heart listens
through the cold stethoscope of fear,
your voice in my head reminds me
what the light teaches.
Slowly you translate fear into love, the way the moon’s blood is the sea."

---------------------------------
I used a lot of lines from the last stanza as part of my wedding vows.

 

[flipper]

Last year I think it was, at night, the widows in our house lit up from the east and then the west. It seems a meteor lit up our whole area according to the news. Here are other examples of fire in the sky:

Multiple explosions were registered last night at 00:36:59 as bolide penetrated the atmosphere. Its fragments could have hit the ground.

The cameras of Bosnia and Hercegovina Meteorite Network run by Orion Astronomic Society and Hydrometeorological Institute in Sarajevo, located in Sarajevo, Gradačac and Pelješac, registered bolide incursion with above -9 magnitude equal to the Moon glow in the first quarter.

This is the brightest meteorite event every since the Meteorite Network commenced with its experimental activities in tracking the sky activity.

The fireball plummeted at 20 km/s speed and exploded/extinguished at about 30 km from the ground.
Fire in the Sky -- Sott.net

 

[Randall]

When I was a kid living in BC Canada, my buddy and I saw what is sometimes called the Great 1972 Fireball. There is even a really bad film of it on YouTube. It was way more amazing in real life, a lot more like the Green Fireballs of project twinkle lore, and I also have a hard time believing it was as small as they say it was.

1972 fireball - US19720810

 

[RenaissanceLady]

This gives an excellent tracker of Comet ISON, which should be most visible around the end of the month. It's now at the point where it can be seen with the naked eye.

Interactive Comet Tracker: Find ISON | TIME.com