The best meteor shower of the year takes place Sunday night. The Geminid Meteor Shower is consistently the most productive meteor shower of the year. It produces more meteors than the most favorite Perseid meteor shower in August.
The only problem with the Geminids is the temperature outside. But don’t let the cold weather stop you. Get nice and warmly dressed and go outside with a hot cup of cocoa and hang out for a while.
The shower can produce as many as 50 meteors in an hour of viewing. Some astronomers are predicting more than a hundred late on Sunday. But living on the Vineyard with frequent cloudy skies, trees everywhere and high moisture in the atmosphere can make it difficult. If you see 20 to 30 in an hour of watching you are doing just fine.
Meteors from the shower tend to radiate from the northeastern sky early in the evening. The meteors appear to come from the zodiacal constellation Gemini, hence the name. Gemini gets high overhead around midnight, and you can see meteors throughout the night.
If the weather is lousy try looking either a night before or afterwards; you could see quite a few.
Day | Sunrise | Sunset |
---|---|---|
Fri., Dec. 11 | 6:58 | 4:11 |
Sat., Dec. 12 | 6:59 | 4:11 |
Sun., Dec. 13 | 6:59 | 4:11 |
Mon., Dec. 14 | 7:00 | 4:11 |
Tues., Dec. 15 | 7:01 | 4:12 |
Wed., Dec. 16 | 7:02 | 4:12 |
Thurs., Dec. 17 | 7:02 | 4:12 |
Fri., Dec. 18 | 7:03 | 4:12 |
Day | Max (Fº) | Min (Fº) | Inches |
---|---|---|---|
Dec. 4 | 55 | 43 | 0.00 |
Dec. 5 | 60 | 47 | 0.76 |
Dec. 6 | 50 | 35 | 2.95 |
Dec. 7 | 40 | 27 | 0.00 |
Dec. 8 | 37 | 30 | *0.03 |
Dec. 9 | 33 | 23 | *T |
Dec. 10 | 42 | 30 | 0.09 |
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