robi2106's Journal: Leonid Meteor Shower Nov 17-19

Those Wacky Leonids Are At It Again

I am talking about the annual Leonid Meteor shower. There should be a new moon (aka little visible moon light) so the sky should be nice and dark, providing that you live in the correct side ofthe globe that is effectively "facing" the oncoming path of the debris as the earth moves across this section of the solar system. Check out SpaceWeather.com for a great map of the solar system that contains this debris cloud. Here is a sky map which tells you what part of the sky to look for and where the streaks are likely to go. Not a guarantee of course, but a good chance. You of course need to visit NASA's site dedicated to the Leonids for a bunch of other good information. According to this map, which indicates which part of our rock will be facing "forward" (i.e. facing into the direction of travel around the sun), Europe and the Eastern US get the best chance to see the shower.

Viewers along the northeastern coast of the United States and Canada, as well as people in Europe and western Africa might get to see a possible "outburst" of as many as 100-600 meteors per hour. This spike in activity is predicted for 11:45 p.m. - 1:33 a.m. EST on November 18-19 (4:45 - 6:33 UT on November 19). This outburst is tied to Earth's passage through a particularly dense debris trail left by the comet 55P Tempel-Tuttle during its 1932 pass around the Sun.

From Nasa...
The traditional maximum of the annual Leonid shower is earlier on November 17, around 16:45 UT, well placed for the western USA (early morning of November 18 local time). More information:

Extra: Don't believe everything you read. While meteor forecasters have done a splendid job predicting Leonid outbursts in recent years--sometimes "nailing the peak within minutes"--they could be wrong in 2006. The outburst might happen at an unexpected time or it might be better than expected. Cooke urges enthusiasts everywhere to keep an eye out for Leonid meteors the nights of Nov. 17th - 19th. "The best time to look," he says, "is just before local dawn when the constellation Leo is high in the sky." (last paragraph from here.

Details aside, I found it amazing that astronomers are able to back-calculate the path of celestial bodies and find out what parts of the solar system, which is moving as a whole through space any way, were visited and when. Amazing. Simply mid bending calculations needed to find those places in space. Lets face it.... space is B I G and there is a lot of it. These have to be some amazingly complicated related rates calculus problems.

So got get up earlier than usual. Put on some coffee or hot chocolate, grab some blankets and enjoy what could be only a faint meteor shower. But what else do you have to spend your time on? Honestly. I would probably just be sleeping away then so why not put my time to better use.

Jason