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EI2GYB > ASTRO 09.10.25 12:01l 63 Lines 6049 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
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Subj: Look to the skies this week to see the 'Draconid' meteor sh
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Look to the skies this week to see the 'Draconid' meteor shower
Stargazers and meteor enthusiasts across North America could be treated to a spectacular light show under the right conditions during this week's "Draconid shower."
It's the result of Earth plowing through the dusty trail left behind by an oddly orbiting comet called 21P/Giacobini-Zinner.
The shower is active during a short brief window from Oct. 6 to Oct. 10, reaching a peak as Earth passes through "the densest section of the debris trail" at 3 p.m. EDT (1900 GMT) on Oct. 8, according to Space.com.
What makes this week's sky tapestry so special? We spoke to Northeastern University assistant professor Jacqueline McCleary, an observational cosmologist, for some of the basics-and what to watch for.
McCleary's comments have been edited for brevity and clarity.
We're interested in these 'Draconids,' but first tell us how meteor showers form.
OK, so let's first talk about comets. Your average comet is a dirty snowball; it's not an asteroid that is tightly packed. So, when comets pass near the sun, this icy material boils off; some of the dust gets left behind, making for these very pretty tails, which appear white. And some of that material gets ionized, leaving a very pretty blue tail.
A meteor shower is Earth passing through the remnants of one of those dusty white tails left behind. There are lots of meteor showers throughout the year-some better known than others. The Draconids, in particular, tend to be less celebrated because of the following: They're left behind by a comet called 21P/Giacobini-Zinner. The comet was discovered in 1900, and it's a periodic comet-meaning one that hangs out in the inner solar system and repeats its orbit over and over again-as opposed to something like 3I/ATLAS, which makes one pass and then gets kicked out.
The material with this comet normally stays bunched up near the end. There are other comets, like comet Swift-Tuttle, where the debris field is pretty uniformly distributed along its orbit. With Giacobini-Zinner, it's a small comet-all of the stuff is usually clustered near the head. So, most years, the meteor shower that results from us passing through this debris field is just a few per hour-not much more than what you would get on any other night.
Why are people excited about this meteor shower in 2025?
The reason people are excited about it this year is that the comet just made its perihelion-its closest approach to the sun-in March. That means there's a lot of fresh debris clustered near the sun. I realize this is a little abstract and maybe hard to picture, but the key point is: we're passing almost head-on through the material left behind by the comet, which has only been there since March, so it hasn't had much time to drift away.
So instead of the usual 5 to 10 meteors per hour, we might see dozens-or, if we're lucky, even hundreds per hour. In past years, there have been passes where observers recorded 400 or 500 meteors per hour. That's about 10 per minute-a lot. I'm not sure we'll get that lucky this time, but the potential is definitely there.
Where do names like 'Giacobini-Zinner' and 'Draconids' come from?
Comets and asteroids are usually named after their discoverers, and Giacobini and Zinner were the discoverers. Usually, the little prefix relates to some campaign of observation. For example, 3I/ATLAS means "third interstellar" comet discovered by the ATLAS observatory.
Draconids-it's a very strange name. The radiant point, or the point from which all the meteors appear to radiate, is in the head of the constellation Draco. So, they're called Draconids because the meteors seem to originate from Draco. The Orionids, another meteor shower, seem to originate from Orion; the Perseids come from the constellation Perseus; and so on. So, the meteor shower is usually named after the constellation from which it appears to originate.
When and where is the best time to see the Draconids this year?
The best time to observe this will be shortly after sunset. So essentially, as soon as it gets dark, try to go find it, because the meteor showers themselves sink below the horizon.
And unfortunately, this year we've got a near-full moon rising at about the same time, so the sky will be a little brighter than normal-meaning we won't be seeing hundreds per hour, simply because the moonlight is going to wash it out.
But because you don't have to get up at 3 in the morning to see it, and because it'll be visible from most places in the Northern Hemisphere, it's certainly worth trying to get out there and take a look.
Provided by Northeastern University
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