Goodness, Gracious, Great Balls of Fire!

Friday, November 4th, 2005 at 04:00 PM by Dave

This month gives us a chance to see some nice "Shooting Stars", or meteors. Meteors are bits of sand and debris from comets that strike our Earth’s atmosphere and burn up.

(Click on image for full-size version.) A Taurid fireball photographed Oct. 28, 2005, by Hiroyuki Iida of Toyama, Japan (Courtesy the Science@NASA website)

During this week’s SCSU Astronomy Public Nights, people taking advantage of the free telescope observing have seen portions of the sky illuminated with sporadic bright meteors. Several sightings from the east coast of the United States have stated they have seen "fireballs." Typical meteors are due to microscopic space debris hitting the Earth’s atmosphere at speeds of about 25 miles per second (about 50 times faster than a rifle bullet), creating a streak of light as they heat up due to the friction against the air. Fireballs occur when chunks of debris larger than a grain of sand enter the Earth’s atmosphere. They are much brighter than typical meteors, sometimes even briefly outshining the moon. Sometimes these fire balls even leave a smoke trail through the sky. I once saw a Taurid meteor moving slowly across the sky from west to east across the constellation Orion at 4 a.m. This meteor appeared to move slowly, hanging in the sky. It left a very visible smoke trail.

The meteors seen at Public Nights this week are from the debris field left by Comet Encke and are a part of the Taurid meteor shower. The name of this meteor shower comes from the fact that the meteors seems to emanate from the constellation Taurus. The best time to see the Taurids is around midnight (or later) when the constellation appears towards the south. The Taurid meteor shower peaks between November 5th and November 12th.

Later this month the Leonid meteor shower will strike the Earth. The Leonids appear to come from the constellation Leo. Leo rises later in the night than Taurus. The Leonids will not be as easily seen due to a waning gibbous phase. This additional light will mask some of the fainter Leonids. The Leonids peak around the evening of November 18th. They only last several days, whereas the Taurids, may last two weeks.

While you are out during the night this month, enjoy the "shooting stars!"

Posted in Astronomy News

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