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Geminid Meteor Shower

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the break-out-your-hard-hat dept.

An anonymous reader writes "physorg.com is carrying a story on the upcoming Geminid meteor shower, which will peak on December 13th. This is usually a high-rate meteor shower, and this year will be no different. The early morning hours are the best time to see them. Space.com is also reporting on the shower. This shower was also covered by Slashdot in 2003, 2002, and 2001."

5 of 122 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Naked eyes and/or binoculars... by imsabbel · · Score: 5, Informative

    Binoculars not only dont help, they hurt. Telescopes even more...
    You need to be able to watch as much of the sky as possibly... the small aperture of any maginification device will only cause you to muss most of the events...

    --
    HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
  2. Ok, i'll bite by daniil · · Score: 3, Informative

    Don't worry if you miss this one, for Mother Nature has a Christmas present for you. The Ursids are next. They max out on December 22-23. It's not as strong as the Geminid shower, but hey, it's still better than nothing.

    --
    Man is a slave because freedom is difficult, whereas slavery is easy.
  3. Re:Meteor scatter by Flying+Purple+Wombat · · Score: 4, Informative

    The signals are actually reflected from the trails of ionized gas created by the rocks burning up in the atmosphere. The rocks themselves are far too small to be useful reflectors.

    --
    If God had meant for man to see the sunrise, He would have scheduled it later in the day.
  4. Can I see them in Somerset? by Limax+Maximus · · Score: 2, Informative

    I saw several Meteors between 11pm last night and 2am this morning on the North Wales coast while doing some field work on some lagoons there (don't ask, Ok). It was certainly the best view of meteors I have had made even better by seeing some reflections of them in the pools. In Somerset you will certainly be able to see them unless you're: a) in a town centre b) standing below a street light c) It's cloudy (Yes, I know someone who spent hours looking on a cloudy night) d) blind e) unlucky It might take a while and don't expect to see one in 5 minutes - I was lucky last night as I'd forgotten about it until I saw a streak across the sky and started to look. I was also unlucky as my welly leaked and it wasn't all that warm last night... Limax Max (a geek who gets out - almost)

  5. Hints for observing and reporting by lbastiae · · Score: 2, Informative

    The International Meteor Organization has some guidelines online for reporting your observations of the Geminids. Take a look at http://www.imo.net/news/news.html#geminids2004 Good luck... Luc