Oldest known meteor shower, Lyrid, coming to your local sky

William Atkins
Saturday, 21 April 2007 17:09

Science - Space

The meteor shower actually consists of pieces of material from the comet Thatcher that glow when they hit and disintegrate within the Earth’s atmosphere. Comet Thatcher takes about 415 years to orbit the Sun, with an orbit that takes it further than the orbit of Neptune and closer to the Sun than the Earth’s orbit.

Comet Thatcher, officially named Comet C/1861 G1, was discovered by A.E. Thatcher on April 5, 1861 in New York. It was also independently discovered by Carl Wilhelm Baeker. The comet has been watched by humans on the Earth for over 2,600 years. Records show that the ancient Chinese observed it over 2,000 years ago—the first recording was on 687 B.C.—making it the oldest meteor shower on record.

According to the International Meteor Organization (IMO, a leading international amateur meteor group), the Lyrids has a highly inclined orbit, which means that its path does not come near the Earth and the other planets within the solar system. For that reason, its path is not disturbed much by planetary gravity. However, as the comet orbits the Sun it exhibits an atmosphere (called a coma). The atmosphere contains clumps of debris (rocks, dust, and ice), which exhibits outbursts of activity that can be seen on the Earth.

In order to observe the Lyrid meteor shower, watch from a relatively dark spot that is away from bright lights. The meteors will appear throughout the night sky, although their paths will seem to come from the constellation Lyra, which is located in the northeast sky just before dawn. The best time to view them this weekend will be early Saturday and Sunday mornings. About ten to 15 meteors per hour should appear in the sky during the peak of the show.