by What will potentially be the best meteor display of the year is just around the corner, and set to peak Wednesday night or early Thursday morning, December 13-14: The Meteor Shower Geminids.
If you were disappointed with the meager spectacle of last month’s Leonid meteor shower, don’t worry. The Geminids are usually the most satisfying of all the annual showers, surpassing even the famous Perseids of August. Studies of past displays show that this shower is reputed to be rich in both slow, bright, graceful meteors and fireballs and faint meteors, with relatively fewer medium-bright objects. The Geminids typically encounter Earth at 35 kilometers (22 miles) per second; about half the speed of a Leonid meteor. Many appear in a yellowish tone. Some have even been seen to form irregular or divided paths.
The Geminids are named after the constellation Gemini, the Twins. On the night of this shower’s peak, the meteors will appear to emanate from a point in the sky near the bright star Castor in Gemini.
The Earth is moving rapidly through this stream of meteorites, producing a somewhat broad and unbalanced activity profile. Rates rise steadily for two to three days before the peak, reaching about a quarter of their peak strength, and then fall more sharply. The late Geminids, however, tend to be especially bright. Renegade precursors can be seen for a week or more before maximum, but three nights after peak activity, the Geminids virtually disappear for another year.
Related: Meteor showers 2023: When will the next one be?
Excellent conditions in 2023.
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The Geminids perform excellently in any year, but 2023 can be classified as a “magnificent year.” Last year’s exhibition On the contrary, it was seriously compromised by the bright moonlight when a bright gibbous moon appeared on the horizon during the late afternoon hours and swept away many of the fainter Geminid streaks with its bright light.
But this year, the moon will be in a new phase on December 12. On peak night, the moon will be a thin crescent, low in the west-southwest at dusk and setting around 5 pm Wednesday night. That means the sky will be dark and moonless for the rest of the night, creating perfect conditions for viewing the rain.
According to Margearet Campbell-Brown and Peter Brown in the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada’s Observer’s Manual 2023, the Geminids are expected to reach their maximum activity at 2 pm EDT (1900 GMT). That means those places from eastern Europe and northeastern Africa to as far east as central Russia and China are in the best position to reach the peak of the rain, when speeds could possibly exceed 120 per hour! But peak rates persist at only marginally reduced levels for about 6 to 10 hours around the largest ones, so other places (like North America) should also enjoy excellent Geminid activity.
In fact, under normal conditions on the peak night, with ideal dark sky conditions, you can expect at least 60 or more Geminid meteors to cross the sky every hour on average (light pollution greatly reduces the numbers).
Best views after 10 pm
Generally speaking, depending on your location, Gemini begins to appear above the east-northeast horizon just as evening twilight comes to an end. Therefore, you may see some of the first Geminids as soon as the sky darkens. There is also a good chance of seeing some “Earth-grazing” meteors. Earth grazers are long, bright shooting stars that fly by from a point close to or even just below the horizon. These meteors are so distinctive because they follow long paths almost parallel to our atmosphere.
The Geminids begin to appear noticeably more numerous starting at 10:00 p.m. local time, because by then the radiant of the shower is already quite high in the eastern sky. The best views, however, are obtained around 2 in the morning, when its radiant point will pass almost overhead. The higher the radiant of a shower, the more meteors it produces all over the sky.
Wrap!
But keep this in mind: This time of year, meteor viewing can be a long, cold grind. You wait and wait for the meteorites to appear. When they don’t appear right away, and if you’re cold and uncomfortable, you won’t be looking for meteors for long!
Spending the night in a sleeping bag under the stars is an attractive proposition in summer, and as a result, many holiday campers independently “discover” the August Perseids. But it’s a completely different story for the Geminids, which in December require lying on the ground or in a long lawn chair for several hours after midnight, staring at a clear sky that has caused radiative cooling and a drop in temperatures since the sunset.
The late Henry Neely (1879-1963), who for many years was a popular lecturer at New York’s Hayden Planetarium, once said this about observing the Geminids: “Take the advice of a man whose teeth have chattered in Many occasions”. winter night: dress warmer than you think necessary.
Hot chocolate or coffee can soothe the cold and provide a light pick-me-up. It’s even better if you can watch with friends. That way, you can keep each other awake and cover more of the sky. Give your eyes time to adjust to the darkness before you begin.
The progenitor is an asteroid.
The Geminids differ from other meteor showers in that they appear to have been generated not by a comet, but by 3200 Phaëthon, an active Earth-crossing Apollo asteroid whose orbit brings it closer to the Sun than any other named asteroid. For this reason, it received its name from the Greek myth of Phaethon, son of the sun god Helios.
Then again, the Geminids could be remnants of a comet after all, as some astronomers consider Faëthon to be actually the dead nucleus of a burned-out comet that somehow became trapped in an unusually narrow orbit.
If you want to try photographing the Geminids or any other meteor shower, be sure to check out our guide on how to photograph meteors and meteor showers. And if you need imaging gear, consider our best cameras for astrophotography and best lenses for astrophotography.
Editor’s note: If you take a great photo of the Geminid meteor shower and would like to share it with Space.com and our news partners for a story or image gallery, send images and comments to spatialphotos@space.com.
Joe Rao serves as an instructor and guest lecturer at New York University. Hayden Planetarium. Write about astronomy during natural history magazinehe Farmers’ Almanac and other publications.
