The Earth will be blessed once again with one of the most spectacular meteor showers lighting up the night sky in the northern hemisphere - the Perseid meteor shower.
It's a good starting point for new stargazers because you don't need a telescope to watch this annual celestial event. You can expect more than 50 or 60 visible meteorites per hour to burn through our atmosphere.
What Is The Best Time to Watch the Perseid Meteor Showers?
The Perseid meteor shower peaks at one in the morning, in the early hours of Saturday, according to Dr. Darren Baskill, an astrophotographer at the University of Sussex, as reported in Science Focus.
According to him, the Earth will pass right through the center of the comet Swift-dust Tuttle's trail. A meteor, also known as a shooting star, is typically visible every minute or two during peak hours from a clear, dark site and moves quickly.
What Effect Will Friday's Supermoon Have on the Upcoming Perseid Meteor Shower?
Moonlight can make it challenging to see meteor showers. The full Sturgeon supermoon that will rise early in the morning of Aug. 12 will overpower the shooting stars. So, you can only see fewer meteor showers.
Even though your chances of seeing meteors decrease significantly around the peak, you might decide to go outside on a night when the moon won't be visible. Look for days when the moon rises early in the morning, for example, and set by the time the sky turns dark using a moonrise and moonset calendar.
What Will Weather Conditions Be Like During the Meteor Shower?
The monsoon season's weather can be erratic and change quickly at any time of day. In other words, depending on where you are, your experience might be different.
If you'd like to know what the weather will be like that night, the Dark Sky website provides hyperlocal weather forecasts for a particular area.
Where in the Sky Should You Look for the Meteor Shower?
The meteors seem to have come from the constellation Perseus, thus the name Perseid. To determine which direction you should be looking, pulling out a star map is not necessary.
It's best to simply look directly up because these shooting stars could appear anywhere. If you're lucky, you might see a shooting star every few minutes coming from the sky.
Meteors are known as "shooting stars" because they flash across the sky before disappearing. Although we know the region of the sky from which the meteor shower is coming, we cannot predict where any particular meteor will appear. Therefore, a much wider field of vision will benefit you more than a telescope.
How Can You Increase Your Chances of Seeing a Meteor Shower?
Locate a spot outside with as little artificial light as possible, then lie back to take in as much of the sky as you can.
Then, give your eyes up to 20 minutes to adjust without using any other light sources, including your phone. Your aim in doing this is to improve your night vision.
A dark sky will make it easier to see meteors. If you don't want to travel to a remote area, get as far away from the lights of the street as you can, preferably in the middle of a park.
You can also visit the website Clear Sky Chart, which provides forecasts for visibility and skywatching in specific areas.
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