Every year late July and August is a great time for viewing meteor showers or falling stars as many will call them. This time my fellow steemians friends from the south hemisphere will be able to see some natural fireworks provided by the the debris left by Comet 96P/Machhloz.
Don't need to be envious of the ones living in the north hemisphere being able to see the Perseid meteor shower which I wrote about a couple of days ago.
[Delta Aquarid meteor shower photographed in Yellowstone National Park, USA, 2008. (Image: Jeff Berkes/Flickr)]
Comet 96P/Machhloz has a short period of about 5 years and will have its next perihelion next October 27, so you might want to prepare your telescope or just get a new one!
'What's the perihelion?' you might ask. In astronomy perihelion is the point in the orbit of a celestial object when it's most close to the Sun.
The other way around the aphelion is when an object is at it's farthest away point from the Sun.
[Image by Sergio C.]
Donald Machholz is the name of the american amateur astronomer that discovered the comet in 1986.
David G. Schleicher in his work has observed, using narrowband photometry analysis, that Comet 96P/Machhloz as an unusual composition. "It is shown to be depleted of CN by about a factor of 72 from average, while C2 and C3 are also low, but “only” by factors of 8 and 19, respectively, from “typical” composition... In contrast, NH is near the mid-to-upper end of its normal range." [Schleicher, David G. (2008). "The Extremely Anomalous Molecular Abundances of Comet 96P/MACHHOLZ 1 from Narrowband Photometry"]
Why are they called Delta Aquariid meteors?
Delta Aquariid meteor shower is not the only event with the Aquariid name, there are several meteor events with this name because the showers appear to radiate from the constellation of Aquarius.
Where to see the Delta Aquariid meteor shower?
The most spectacular is the Delta Aquariid which can be seen in the next nights in the southern hemisphere with an average of 15 to 20 meteors an hour. Grab your popcorns, your picnic blanket and go outside watch the sky at night, It'll be worth it.
As usual this events are best viewed with a clear night out of ambient light pollution from the cities or other sources of light.
This year the moon will help not reflecting sunlight as it will set before midnight.
The best time to see the meteors is between midnight and dawn. At this time the radiant should be high in the sky to the north, a little lower than the zenith (the point directly overhead).
Don't worry if you miss the peak meteor shower on July 27 and 28, this is the time when you can see more meteors every hour, which means that some time after this date you'll still be able to catch some flashy fireball action on the sky. They'll be on the southern night skies every year from about July 12 to August 23.
Have fun watching falling stars!