Perseid meteor shower

I'd completely forgotten about this meteor shower until my sister-in-law posted about falling off her louger after seeing a meteor! So I thought I'd better pop outside and see if I would be lucky enough to see some.

With Earth ploughing through the stream of dust left by the Swift-Tuttle comet, there are lots of chucks of ice and rocks shooting through our atmosphere. And through patience (well standing around for about 15 minutes) I was able to see three meteors at around 2am on Saturday morning. It was really cool because The Plough, which can look like a saucepan was actually in the correct alighnment to actually look like a saucepan. This meant that two of the three meteors looked like they were jumping into the saucepan from my perspective! - see the artist's impression below.

Artist's Impression

After a while I decided to implement the rigourous scientific method for deciding the length of time I would continue observations by counting down from 30 in my head. Unfortunately the time elapsed and no additional meteors were witnessed. Even after whispering 'I'm going now'; the night sky contined its abstenance. It would seem that heavenly bodies are not concerned with viewing figures, unlike ITV or the BBC. Damn them.

Well if you want to watch this meteor shower - you still have time! The best night is tonight - Saturday 11 August. The best time is ideally between 12am and 4am. Happy viewing.