The big news this week, astronomically speaking, is of course, the Leonid meteor shower.  The good news is that the Leonids occur at new Moon for the first time many years and there will be no bright moonlight to keep you from seeing the meteors.  Some astronomers are also predicting a ‘half-storm’ on Wednesday morning, 18 November.

Go outside after 9:00 p.m. on Monday and Tuesday night this week, face east (that's opposite where the Sun disappeared from your house) and if you're patient, you just might see an astounding sight.  You may see streaks of light rocket up from the eastern horizon and disappear overhead.  

Shooing stars that seem to come from the ocean?  What's going on?  Those shooting stars aren't stars at all, they're meteors.  No matter whether you call them meteors, meteoroids, bolides, or shooting or falling stars, these streaks of light are always impressive.  They are, of course, burning rocks.  There’s lots of leftovers in the solar system from the formation of the planets.  If one of these rocks intersects Earth’s orbit, it enters our upper atmosphere at incredible speed.  The friction of its passage through the air causes the rock heat up.  Eventually the rock catches on fire and burns and we see the light of its fiery death above us.

Comets are notorious litterbugs and they leave a path full of rocks and dust in their wake as the Sun melts their ice.  If one of these dusty paths crosses Earth’s path, we see many meteors in the sky that seem to come from the same point.  This is called a meteor shower.  On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday this week, Earth will cross the dusty path of Comet Tempel-Tuttle.  This obscure dark comet is dark because it has more dust than ice in its make-up and the Leonids are traditionally the best meteor shower of the year.
It's called the Leonid meteor shower because the meteors originate in the head of the constellation Leo the Lion.  Leo's head looks like a backward question mark in the sky.  It’s also called the Sickle after a similarly-shaped farm implement.  Leo's head rises just after midnight.

You can also watch the Leonids just before dawn on Tuesday and Wednesday.  By that time, Leo will be almost straight overhead and you'll see several meteors if the clouds let you.  Some astronomers are predicting great things for the Leonids this year.  They’re saying there may be a peak of over 500 meteors an hour on Wednesday morning, 18 November.  Astronomers consider that we’ve had a meteor ‘storm’ if it produces over a thousand meteors an hour, so 500 meteors per hour is called a ‘half-storm’.

The Leonids typically produce about 50 meteors an hour or a meteor a minute, so 500 per hour would be impressive.  The projected peak occurs after sunrise for us, around 9:00 a.m. on Wednesday, but these predictions aren’t completely accurate.  I, for one, plan to have my lawn chair outside around 5:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning looking for the shooting stars streaking away from Leo.  Happy hunting and good luck watching the Lion roar!  
 

 Would you like to be on the Planetarium e-mail list and receive a monthly reminder of the Planetarium shows and occasional notices of cool things in the sky?  Just send an e-mail to stars@guam.net requesting that you be added and I'll put you on the list!
 

Don't forget that you can hear this information on Guam's public radio station KPRG, 89.3 on your radio dial.  The program is called Tropical Skies and it airs twice on Monday, during the noon hour at 12:25 and at 6:01 in the evening.  Support your public radio station

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