October 17, 2007

Orionid Meteor Shower (Sunday 10/21)



The Orionid Meteor shower will peak early Sunday morning and the meteors should be visible anywhere from 1:30am until sunrise.

The radiant of the meteor shower appears above and to the left of Betelgeuse, the massive red giant that marks Orion's upper left (from your perspective) shoulder blade.

The Orionids are an annual occurance that happens when the Earth travels through the debris trail of Haley's Comet.

Predictions for this year are looking quite optimistic and promising. We can expect the Orionid rate to be about twice the normal rate of twenty meteors per hours, according to the preliminary predictions of Sato and Watanabe of the Japanese Astronomical Observatory.