Orionid meteor showers to amaze stargazers this week
You don’t want to miss this: the peak of Orionid meteor showers will light up the sky on the night of Wednesday, October 21, just before sunrise. And no telescope is needed to check out the stunning sight!
The Orionid meteor showers happen annually in the (northern) autumn: the Earth is now traveling through the area of space with debris from Halley’s Comet.
The best way to watch is to wake up a couple of hours before sunrise, and look up towards the constellation Orion.
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You can even see the fantastic view with the naked eye - although NASA says this year it might not be as bright as usual.
"The Orionids will probably show weaker activity than usual this year. Bits of comet dust hitting the atmosphere will probably give us about a dozen meteors per hour," Bill Cooke of the NASA Meteoroid Environments Office at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
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NASA will be streaming the event live starting from October 21, 10pm EDT (02:00 GMT).
Apart from Orionids, one will see the ‘Dog Star’ Sirius, winter constellations like Orion, Gemini, and Taurus, as well as the planets Jupiter and Venus.
The next meteor shower, the Leonids, is set to take place on November 18.
