Home » , » Rare ‘Unicorn’ Meteor Shower May Light Up Sky This Week

Rare ‘Unicorn’ Meteor Shower May Light Up Sky This Week

No comments
A rare Alpha Monocerotids "outburst" may illuminate the night sky on Nov. 21. (Photo Credit: S. Molau & P. Jenniskens / NASA / Ames)

Astronomers are predicting that a rare “unicorn meteor storm” will appear in the night sky on Nov. 21. Even though predictions say there could be up to 1,000 meteors per hour, other experts say this cool light show may be smaller in size.

Meteor scientists Peter Jenniskens and Esko Lyytinen said there may be an “outburst” of the Alpha Monocerotid meteor shower on Thursday night, according to the American Meteor Society. The Alpha Monocerotids, which occur around Nov. 22 every year, are also known for four outbursts that occurred in 1925, 1935, 1985, and 1995, and it may happen again later this week, Newsweek noted.

Jenniskens and Lyytinen said the number of meteors observers may see range from “maybe only about a hundred to even storm level,” with a rate of more than 1,000 every 60 minutes. Of course, these predictions depend on how clear the night sky is on Nov. 21 and if conditions are not good, the actual meteor count may be lower.

Other experts, including NASA’s Meteoroid Environment office lead Bill Cooke, are warning skygazers to not get their hopes up for the “unicorn meteor shower.”

“As the media inquiries increased, I began to wonder if all the attention is justified,” Cooke wrote in a NASA blog post. “Being a meteor shower forecaster, I am all too aware of the fact that such predictions (including mine), while pretty accurate on the timing, often estimate a shower intensity higher (factors of a few) than what actually takes place.”

According to Cooke, the intensity of this “outburst” depends on the size of the parent comet’s orbit. If it’s way smaller or larger, the distance from the stream center will be bigger and no sky show will take place. Instead, normal AMOs (short for Alpha Monocerotid meteor stream) would be at their normal rate of about three meteors per hour. But, if the “outburst” does take place, then it would be a really cool meteor show to watch.

“Since we have not yet discovered this mysterious parent comet, who knows how close the estimate of the orbit is to the actual? A good reason to step outside Thursday night, because the cool thing is that if an outburst does occur, we will have a pretty good idea of the orbit of this comet – not from observing the comet with telescopes, but by counting its debris as they burn up in our atmosphere,” Cooke added.

For those planning to catch the potential “unicorn meteor storm,” the American Meteor Society suggests getting an early start and finding an area away from city lights. The meteor shower may start at roughly 11:15 p.m. EDT and end at approximately 11:45 p.m. EDT. People on the east coast of the U.S. may have better views of the “outburst,” even though people in western states may be able to spot it as well.

More on Geek.com:



from Geek.com https://ift.tt/2pBihut
via IFTTT

0 comments:

Post a Comment