Delta Aquarid Meteor Shower Peaks This Weekend
Baku, July 27 (AZERTAC). The annual Delta Aquarid meteor shower peaks this weekend, but skywatchers shouldn`t get their hopes up for a dazzling show, experts say. The Delta Aquarids should peak overnight from Saturday to Sunday (July 28 and 29) — bad timing, since the streaking meteors will be sharing the sky for much of the night with a bright moon. This year`s shower is "basically going to suck, as the peak will be only 4 days from the August 2 full moon," Bill Cooke, head of NASA`s Meteoroid Environment Office at Marshall Space Flight Center in While the Delta Aquarids are visible from all over the globe, viewers in the Southern Hemisphere tend to get a better show because the meteors appear to radiate from the sky`s southern reaches. Indeed, they seem to originate near the bright star Delta Aquarius (in the constellation Aquarius), which is how the shower got its name. At its peak intensity this weekend, the shower is expected to generate about 16 meteors per hour in a dark sky, Cooke said. But skywatchers will have to stay up late to get the full effect; the moon won`t set until after midnight local time. Meteor showers are generated when Earth plows through streams of debris shed by comets on their path around the sun. These particles burn up in our planet`s atmosphere, leaving behind brief, bright streaks in the sky. Scientists don`t know the identity of the Delta Aquarids` parent comet for sure, but they have a few ideas. The most likely candidate is perhaps 96P/Machholz, a comet discovered in 1986 by amateur astronomer Don Machholz. While the Delta Aquarids may be somewhat underwhelming this year, skywatchers have another shower to look forward to in just a few weeks. The Perseids, considered by many stargazers to be the best meteor display of the year, are due to peak overnight from Aug. 12 to 13. Each summer skywatchers all over the world look forward to observing the annual mid-August performance of the Perseid meteors, but often overlook some of the lesser showers that peak in the days leading up to the main event. This year, sadly, the full moon will seriously hamper the 2011 Perseid meteor shower. But this week, the moon is a thin waning crescent and will arrive at new phase on Saturday, leaving the sky dark and moonless from dusk to dawn. This makes it a great opportunity to enjoy two displays of "shooting stars" that will be active and near their peak this weekend, which can provide some entertaining viewing: the Delta Aquarids and the Alpha Capricornids.
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