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The Orionid meteor shower peaks this week! Here's what to expect.
This year,
Orionid visibility extends from Oct. 16 to Oct. 26, with peak activity of perhaps 15 to 30 meteors per hour coming on the morning of Oct. 21. Step outside before sunrise on any of these mornings and if you catch sight of a meteor, there's about a 75% chance that it likely is a byproduct of Halley's Comet. The very last Orionid stragglers usually appear sometime in early to mid-November.
The best time to watch begins from about 1 or 2 a.m. local daylight time until the first light of dawn (at around 5:45 a.m.), when Orion stands highest above the southern horizon. The higher in the sky Orion is, the more meteors appear all over the sky. The Orionids are one of just a handful of known meteor showers that can be observed equally well from both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.
Orionid meteors are normally dim and not well seen from urban locations, so it's suggested that you find a safe rural location to see the best Orionid activity.
The Orionid meteor shower is an annual occurrence comprised of detritus from Haley's comet. With the moon only a slender crescent this will be a good year to watch them.
The name refers to the fact that the meteors radiate from just above Betelgeuse in the constellation Orion.
Previous Coverage
Orionid Meteor Shower (2015)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 19 2020, @06:31AM (2 children)
If you think global warming is troubling now, imagine the earth's temperature if a single star were to fall from the sky onto the earth - ignoring for the moment the faster-than-light travel that would entail. Hence the problem with taking Matthew 24:29 literally. Please spread the word.
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Meteor showers are fun to watch, though.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday October 19 2020, @03:31PM (1 child)
https://www.amazingfacts.org/media-library/media/e/1255/f/6/t/are-the-prophecies-of-matthew-chapter-24-literal-or-figurative- [amazingfacts.org]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 19 2020, @09:30PM
Then it is safe to say that none of the fixed stars have fallen, nor will any fall in any geologically meaningful time-span in any literal sense.
And as for meteor showers, one might assert that there has been no year lacking such events, and therefore, the prophecy is useless as a signal of end-times (if taken literally) since every year features multiple such instances of "falling stars". Still the 1833 event is remarkable, and seems to coincide with the advent of powered flight in Paris in September 1852 - where people started traveling through the air, as they continue to do today.
Still, the passage would certainly make more sense if taken figuratively.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 19 2020, @08:36PM
I went into a state forest near a river Friday night / Saturday morning and counted between 0100-0400 local time.
0100-0200: 8
0200-0300: 12
0300-0400: 13
Total: 33
I was having trouble staying awake after a day of work at 0400 alone in the woods, so I went home after this.
Most of these are thin lines of dust, but a few (4 for me) are small fireballs that last ~1sec and streak across half the sky. Expect to see standard green and yellow.
It was fun to watch Orion rise, using mostly fixed treetops as an easy gauge of change. It was a perfectly clear, moonless night with no humidity and a low around 50F. I could see a clear line from Mars in the west to Orion/Sirius in the east, with about 70% of the sky visible, including the fuzzy Milky Way.
To any who also go out to look, happy hunting.