| Title: |
Leonid Meteor Shower |
| Location: |
Hawaiian Island Viewing |
| Date / Time: |
November 17-18 2018 |
| Comments: |
THE 2018 LEONID METEOR SHOWER PEAKS ON THE NIGHT OF SATURDAY, NOV 17TH & EARLY THE FOLLOWING MORNING. Under a dark sky, we would normally expect to see 15 meteors ("shooting stars") per hour, The Leonids should demonstrate some activity from Nov. 16-19, with the peak expected at/after 3AM on Sunday morning, Nov.18th, after the gibbous Moon sets. From around 3AM thru sunrise Sunday morning, get yourself comfortably situated in the darkest area you can find. A lounge chair with blankets & a thermos with a hot beverage would be great. You DO NOT need a telescope or binoculars to see this, or any meteor shower. Just make sure you are warm & comfortable, find a dark spot, & scan the sky for streaks of light! These are fast moving meteors, striking Earth's atmosphere at 44 miles/second (160,000 miles/hour!), & appear to originate or "radiate" from the "sickle" shaped head of Leo, the Lion. Meteor showers occur when the Earth passes through the path of a comet. Tiny bits of debris left behind by comets, most no larger than a grain of sand, create a spectacular light show ("shooting stars") as they enter the Earth's atmosphere. The parent comet for the Leonids is 55P/Temple-Tuttle, which returns to orbit the Sun every 33 years & last visited our region of the solar system in 1997-98. As comet Temple-Tuttle nears the Sun, like any comet, it heats up and leaves a trail of debris behind it. It is these debris that the Earth intersects which produce the Leonid meteor showers. For more info visit http://meteorshowersonline.com/leonids.html
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Maintained by Roz Reiner - Kauai, Hawaii
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