The Leonid Meteor Shower

There will be a meteor shower peaking this weekend that will be visible in the morning sky.  The best time to catch these meteors will be Friday or Saturday at around 4am.  Leo will be high in the sky with the meteors seemingly radiating from the head of the Lion.

This meteor shower is known as the 'Leonids', named after their radiant constellation.

A map below shows the best place in the sky to scout out some great flashes of light.

Leonid Radiant

The Leonid meteor shower tends to have a variable rate each year.  Some years this century have peaked around 100 while other years it has barely reached 10.  A meteor expert named Mikhail Mazlov from Russia has, in fact, published predictions of hourly rate for the entire 21st century.  For anyone wanting to read a technical paper, a link to his work can be found below.

Leonids - Mikhail Maslov

Whether it is accurate or not is another story.  However, this is science.  We can take the given predictions and match them to observed values.  The veracity of the prediction can thus be tested.

This year the paper predicts a weak traditional maximum about 10 meteors per hour.  A lower value was predicted for 2012 but that year had a rate of nearly 50 recorded.  The best thing to do is go outside and see for yourself.  The Moon will be new so there will not be any interference from that source.  If you can, get away from city lights to increase your hourly rate.  This is a shower for people who like to stay up really late or for those who like to get up really early.  A small percentage of people I am sure.  If this inspires just one person to check out the Lion's head this weekend I will be happy.

As with previous meteor showers I have created a printable, downloadable log sheet to draw your observations.  A link to the sheet is provided below.

Leonid Observation Sheet

Instructions for filling it out can be found: Explore the Universe - Meteor Showers

Good luck, and most importantly stay warm!