Spring in the northern hemisphere brings with it the promise for the Lyrids, the first good meteor shower of the season.
Weather is just warming up in April, but we’re not yet in the midst of summer, waiting up late hours for darkness to fall.
As a bonus, several other showers are active in late April, to include the Eta Aquariids and perhaps, a newly discovered shower for the constellation Puppis.
First up are the dependable April Lyrids hailing from the musical constellation of Lyra the Lyre. The exact radiant for the shower lies eight degrees southwest of the bright star Vega, right on the Lyra/Hercules constellation border.
In fact, the radiant sits just about five degrees north of what’s known as the Apex of the Sun’s Way, the direction our solar system is headed in around the Milky Way Galaxy.
Meteors were once thought to be strictly atmospheric phenomena. In fact, that’s why they share the same Greek root “meteoros (high in the air)” with the science and study of weather and atmospheric phenomena, meteorology.
It wasn’t until the mid-19th century that researchers realized that material from space could strike the Earth, and the science of meteoritics was born.
Today, we know that dust streams laid down by comets are responsible for meteors. When the Earth intersects an ancient stream laid down by a comet, a meteor shower occurs.
This is why rates for meteors pick up past local midnight, when the patch of the planet you’re standing on is moving into the path of an oncoming shower.
The source of the Lyrids is the Comet C/1861 G1 Thatcher. On a 415 year orbit, the comet has been seen in modern times exactly once, in 1861. Most years see 15-20 Lyrids per hour, but the shower has been known to produce minor outbursts, such as those seen in 1803 and 1922 approaching 100 per hour, and most recently, a brief 250 per hour outburst in 1982.
The high inclination approach of the shower versus the Earth assures slow-to-medium speed meteors, often starting before local midnight as the radiant clears the northeastern horizon at around 10 PM. The Lyrids are also notorious producers of fireballs. Records of the shower also go way back to Chinese accounts in 687 BC.
Prospects for the Lyrids in 2025
The good news is, the bright Moon is out of the way for the most part versus the 2025 Lyrids, as it’s a 40% illuminated, waning crescent rising at about 3:30 AM local time. Zenithal Hourly Rates (the ZHR, the number of meteors you would expect to see under ideal conditions) for the Lyrids is expected to hit 18 in 2025.
The 2025 Lyrids have a brief peak, centered around 03:00 UT on April 21st (11:00 PM EDT on the evening of April 20th) favoring Europe and, a few hours later, North America.
In contrast, the Eta Aquariids have a broad peak, spanning April 19th to May 28th, centered on May 5th.
The source of the Eta Aquariids is none other than that most famous of all comets, 1/P Halley. The stream from Halley’s Comet actually intersects the orbit of the Earth twice: once in May, and again in October, producing the Orionid meteors.
While northern hemisphere observers may only see a minor uptick of maybe 10 meteors an hour from the Eta Aquariids, southern observers may see considerably more, as the radiant lies a degree south of the celestial equator, near the Y-shaped Water Jar asterism in the constellation Aquarius.
In fact, southern observers often note that this is the best annual meteor shower of the year for the hemisphere. The Eta Aquariids are third in terms of annual productivity and dependability, right behind the Perseids and the Geminids. In 2013, watchers noted a rate topping out at 140 meteors per hour.
Prospects for the 2025 Eta Aquariids see an expected ZHR of 50 right around 1st Quarter Moon on the night of May 4th-5th, putting our natural satellite out of view for the shower starting right around local midnight.
Halley’s comet just reached aphelion 35.14 AU from the Sun on December 9th, 2023, and now begins its long plunge sunward ahead of its next apparition in 2061. Will rates for the Eta Aquariids pick up over the next few decades?
And speaking of southern showers: a recent Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams message reports a new meteor shower radiating from the southern hemisphere constellation Puppis.
The radiant was pegged based on 150 meteors observed by the Global Meteor Network from 14 countries over the nights of March 18th through the 22nd. The orbit suggests that the source of the ‘March Puppids’ is an unidentified, Jupiter family comet.
Another nearby shower known as the pi Puppids peak in late April, and hail from comet 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup. Both radiants are very near the +7th magnitude star pi Puppis. This demonstrates that, when it comes to the science of meteors and meteor showers, there’s still lots of discoveries to be made.
Observing meteors is one of the simplest things you can do in astronomy. All you need is a working set of Mk-1 eyeballs, and patience. Keep a set of binoculars handy, to examine any persistent smoke trains left by bright bolides.
Also, keep an ‘ear’ out for any audible meteors as they crackle or hiss through the night. Once thought to be strictly an audio illusion, it’s now known that such an auditory apparition is the result of what’s known as electrophonic sound.
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It’s also often possible to hear the ‘ping’ of meteors on a radio by tuning in to an unused portion of the FM band.
Photographing meteors is as easy as setting a tripod mounted DSLR to take wide-field exposures of the sky, and seeing what turns up. Be sure to take a series of test exposures first, to get the combination of ISO versus f-stop and timer settings right for the current sky conditions.
Increasingly, modern smartphone cameras equipped with night capture modes are now up to the task of meteor shower astrophotography.
You can report what you see to the IMO, and contribute to the science of meteor showers.
If skies are clear, don’t miss the Lyrid meteors this Easter weekend, and keep an eye out for its close kin.
This article was originally published by Universe Today. Read the original article.
