Astronomers recommend to leave cities to watch Perseid meteor shower

In the night of August 13, people of Earth will be able to watch a star shower: this very night the maximum number of the Perseid meteors will fly past our planet – up to hundreds of ‘shooting stars’ per hour. According to Galina Lyamova, an employee at the Kourov Astronomical Observatory, to watch the falling meteors, one just has to leave the city, lie down on the grass and watch the sky, Znak reports.

It is worth noting that the meteor shower actually has no relation to shooting stars. Shooting stars are actually the remnants of comets, which enter Earth’s atmosphere at high speed and burn down completely in it. “The Perseid meteor shower has such a name because it looks like these meteors fly to us from the Perseus constellation. But it is not like that. In fact, they are flying parallel to the ground, and such an illusion appears because of the perspective effect. A comet flew on this path for a long while ago: it is small grains of sand, dust particles, icicles and other residues from the comet, which left its trace there, that fly past Earth. Every August, when Earth crosses the comet’s orbit, we have an opportunity to watch the meteors burning down in the atmosphere,” the astronomer explained.

It should be noted that the Perseid meteor shower will continue until August 24.