Stargazers have already enjoyed the Eta Aquarids meteor shower earlier this month, but could there be another phenomenon about to grace our skies?
According to NASA, there is a possible newcomer this year in the form of the Tau Herculid shower, which is forecast to peak on the night of May 30 and early morning of May 31.
This potential shower has its origins in a comet known as 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann, or “SW3″, which was discovered in 1930 and orbited the Sun every 5.4 years.
Astronomers later realised the SW3 had shattered into several pieces, littering its own orbital trail with debris, and by the time it passed in 2006, it was in nearly 70 pieces.
It has continued to fragment further since, and now experts predict that the SW3 debris will soon be striking Earth’s atmosphere at just 10 miles per second.
Unfortunately for those in the UK, North American stargazers will be best placed to see the Tau Herculid shower at its peak.
But don’t worry if you miss out on seeing the shower this time, as there are plenty of other opportunities to see the sky full of streaks of light.
Here, we have compiled a complete guide on when, where and how you can see all the meteor showers of 2022.
What exactly is a meteor shower?
A meteor shower occurs when Earth passes through the debris stream occupying the orbit of a comet or, in simpler terms, when a number of meteors flash across the sky from roughly the same point.
Meteors are sometimes called shooting stars, although they actually have nothing to do with stars.
Perspective makes meteor showers appear to emanate from a single point in the sky known as the shower radiant. The typical meteor results from a particle – the size of a grain of sand – vaporising in Earth’s atmosphere when it enters at 134,000mph.
Anything larger than a grape will produce a fireball, which is often accompanied by a persistent afterglow known as a meteor train. This is a column of ionised gas slowly fading from view as it loses energy.
Meteor, meteoroid or meteorite?
A meteor is a meteoroid – or a particle broken off an asteroid or comet orbiting the Sun – that burns up as it enters the Earth’s atmosphere, creating a “shooting star”.
Meteoroids that reach the Earth’s surface without disintegrating are called meteorites.
Meteors are mostly pieces of comet dust and ice no larger than a grain of rice. Meteorites are principally rocks broken off asteroids in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and weigh as much as 60 tonnes.
They can be “stony”, made up of minerals rich in silicon and oxygen, “iron”, consisting mainly of iron and nickel, or “stony-iron”, a combination of the two.
Scientists think about 1,000 tons to more than 10,000 tons of material from meteors falls on Earth each day, but it’s mostly dust-like grains, according to NASA, and they pose no threat to Earth.
There are only two recorded incidents of an injury caused by a meteorite. One of these instances saw a woman bruised by a meteorite, weighing eight pounds, after it fell through her roof in 1954.
Meteor showers in 2022
Perseid meteor shower
The Perseid meteor shower will hit its peak between August 12 and 13 in 2022, allowing stargazers to witness around 160 and 200 meteors entering Earth’s atmosphere every single hour. The shower is particularly prominent in the Northern Hemisphere, in the pre-dawn hours, and is one of the most popular showers, as though it is not the strongest, its spectators can enjoy it during summer.
During its peak, the Perseids sparkle in the summer sky, when the Earth collides with particles of debris left behind by the Swift-Tuttle Comet.
In 2021, the Moon was only 13 per cent full and set as the meteors began to appear – allowing viewers to see around 50 to 75 meteors per hour on its optimum night.
The shower found its name from the Greek word, Perseidai, meaning the sons of Perseus in Greek mythology, which refers to the point in which they appear to hail.
George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism