That moment (4:37 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time) favors the far-western parts of the United States, where the constellation Auriga will be about two-thirds up in the northeast sky around the time morning twilight begins. If you live in Portland, San Francisco or Los Angeles, you'll be in perfect position to view the meteors.

The peak viewing time for the meteor shower is early morning on Saturday, September 1, 2007, when tens of shooting stars, maybe up to 100, will be seen skirting across the sky from the constellation Auriga. The constellation will be found in the northeastern sky, about two-thirds the way up from the horizon. In the past, only about an average of 9 meteors were seen, with maximum amounts of up to 30 observed in 1935 and 1986.

Specifically, the one hour centered around 4:33 am PDT (Pacific Daylight Time) is the peak time, but the entire time possible to see the shooting stars is about two hours. The shower will be visible from locations in the western United States (primarily west of the Rocky Mountains), including Alaska and Hawaii, and from Mexico and the western provinces of Canada.

The shower should contain bright fireballs (some as bright as stars) and strangely colored meteors (such as blue-green).

The origin of the meteors from Auriga is the Comet Kiess (C/1911 N1), which some time around AD 4 (give or take about 40 years) passed by the Sun close enough so that a cloud of dust particles was ejected. Its orbit is a highly elliptical (long-period) comet that has passed into the inner solar system only twice in that last two thousand years.

Its second trip caused the Auriga meteor shower for the years 1935, 1986, 1994, and now in 2007. Most of the time these dust particles miss the orbit of the Earth, but in these four years, they moved into the path of Earth, to give us this meteor shower called the Aurigids.

Will we actually see the meteors shooting across the sky?

Bill Cooke, of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office (Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama, United States), comments: "We have so little experience with ancient debris from long-period comets. Almost anything could happen—from a fizzle to a beautiful meteor shower."

[Author's note: updated 9-1-07, added location in sky to find meteor shower.]

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Astronomy  Comet  NASA  Science  William Atkins