Geminids â€“ a December Spectacle *new*

Imagine the scene: a starry night in mid-December. As your eyes begin to adjust to the darkness, you start to see movement in the sky. At some point you definitely see a shooting star â€“ properly called a meteor. Welcome to what many people think is the year's best meteor shower, the Geminids.

Geminids â€“ a December Spectacle

EarthSky, based in the USA, give the following information about the 2015 Geminids.

This weekend should produce a fair number, but

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the peak nights are expected to be on December 13-14 (night of December 13 till dawn December 14) and 14-15 (night of December 14 till dawn December 15). Geminid meteors tend to be few and far between at early evening, but intensify in number as evening deepens into late night. The waxing crescent moon will set at early evening, leaving dark skies for this yearâ€™s Geminid meteor shower. Geminid meteors are bright! This shower favors Earthâ€™s Northern Hemisphere, but itâ€™s visible from the Southern Hemisphere, too.

The BBC has a nice guide to the Geminids. A nice presentation by The Sky at Night people.

Has anybody seen any Geminids yet? I was out looking for northern lights last night, of which I saw some - but no meteors.

It's Saturday morning in Norway. Last night we were outside watching northern lights and saw a number of Geminids.

Outside on a clear night, if you're staring at the sky for a long time, you're likely to see a few meteors. We identified these specifically as Geminids because they did look as though they were coming from the direction of Castor, which is one of Gemini's two brightest stars.

The numbers should be increasing this weekend, with Sunday night/Monday morning expected to be the peak and with high numbers also expected the following night.

Tonight (Sunday December 13) could be the big night! The Geminids peak is expected.

Sky & Telescope offers North American readers some advice on the Geminids.

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This year the peak should be centered on roughly 18h Universal Time on December 14th. Unfortunately, that's 1 p.m. EST and 10 a.m. PST. So in North America the shower's performance is likely to be similar on the nights of December 13-14 and 14-15.

As the IMO notes, "Near-peak Geminid rates persist for almost a day, so much of the world has a chance to enjoy something of the shower's best."

The Moon will be a waxing crescent a few days old, no trouble at all.

Early in the evening the radiant will still be low in the east; it rises around the end of twilight. So soon after sunset Geminids will be few, even if observers are seeing lots of them a quarter of the way around the world where the radiant is high up.

Last night the clouds came and went, as did the snow, and a few Geminids showed up.

Here's a nice picture from Ã…lbo, Sweden by P-M HedÃ©n. There should be a decent display tonight as well, so if you have a clear sky . . . .

Superb shot of a Geminid fireball over the Vestrahorn mounain in southeast Iceland.

Photo credit: Philip Eaglesfield

The Geminids are over for another year, but here's a composite image taken over a period of 5 hours above the twin 6.5 meter Magellan telescopes of Carnegie Las Campanas Observatory in Chile. Rigel in Orion, and Sirius shine brightly as the Milky Way stretches upward. Near Castor and Pollux the twin stars of Gemini, the meteor shower's radiant, is close to the horizon.

Image Credit & Copyright: Yuri Beletsky (Carnegie Las Campanas Observatory, TWAN)

As a child and young adult I remember looking at the heavens and seeing the stars. Today I can barely see the stars. The trees are huge in our area and with light pollution it is difficult to see the beautiful sky at night.

Angie, that's a great pity. I would like to see light pollution taken as seriously as other kinds of pollution. I think people consider it a specialist problem for astronomers - and who cares - without realizing how it affects the environment, people's health, security, and that it destroys a part of our heritage.

Light Pollution

I had thought to leave the Geminids until next year, but I couldn't resist this composite image of the Geminid meteor shower from New Mexico. The meteors are seen above the antennae of the VLA radio telescope.