Will tonight’s Draconid meteor shower turn into a storm?

If the sky is clear where you live tonight, it might be a great night to go out for a walk after dark, since you might just see a meteor storm coming out of the northern sky.

Last night and tonight is the peak of the Draconid meteor shower, a yearly event that's caused as the Earth passes through the stream of debris left behind by a small comet named '21P/Giacobini-Zinner'. The meteor shower caused by this debris isn't as spectacular as the August Perseids, but every once in awhile the Draconids go through an 'outburst', turning what is normally a shower into a storm. Outbursts seen about 70 or 80 years ago generated meteors in the thousands, whereas ones that happened more recently, like in 2011, produced around 600 per hour.

This video, produced two years ago by the people at Science@NASA, gives a great explanation of this meteor shower and its outbursts:

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Tonight offers some great viewing conditions, as long as your skies are clear and there aren't a lot of sources of light pollution around. Also, with only a thin sliver of a crescent moon along the horizon just after sunset, that should make viewing this one even better.

One thing to note, most meteor showers seem to come from somewhere in the eastern sky, and streak towards the west. However, the Draconids appear to radiate out from the constellation Draco, which is in the northern sky, and they streak generally towards the south. Unlike regions closer to the equator, where Draco dips below the horizon for part of the night, here in Canada, the dragon will be out from sun-down to sun-up. Still, skywatchers recommend looking for this shower just after sunset for the best viewing.

The Draconids are just the first meteor shower this month. Watch for the Orionids meteor shower around October 21st.

(Photo courtesy Reuters)

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