December 22, 2024
The strongest meteor shower of the year will be at its peak on Tuesday night.

The strongest meteor shower of the year will be at its peak on Tuesday night.

The Geminids meteor shower began on Nov. 19, running through Dec. 24. The shower will remain at peak status through Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning.

Bright and colorful meteors can best be seen starting at 10 p.m., according to the American Meteor Society.

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Geminid Meteor Shower
A meteor streaks across the sky during the annual Geminid meteor shower on Dec. 13, 2012.
(AP Photo/Journal & Courier, Michael Heinz)

The Geminids can produce about 100-150 meteors per hour under the right conditions. Although, the waning gibbous moon will make some of the shower less visible to viewers. Because of this, NASA predicts that only about 30-40 meteors will be visible.

Bill Cooke, lead of NASA’s Meteoroid Environments Office at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, suggested viewers watch under shade with a view of the open sky.

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The shower originates from debris of the 3200 Phaethon asteroid. Discovered on Oct. 11, 1983, using the Infrared Astronomical Satellite, the asteroid’s debris orbits around the sun about every year and a half. The Earth passes through the debris each year, according to NASA, causing the shower known as Geminids.

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