(earthtimes.org) - The annual Leonid meteor shower can be viewed this weekend by residents of New England, New York and Western Europe provided the sky stays clear, reports Trend.
Usually a November Leonid shower brings 10 to 20 meteors, but this year the Comet Tempel-Tuttle has left behind a denser trial through which the Earth will traverse, according to Brian Marsden, a senior astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Consequently there will be a higher concentration of meteors.
Tom Whitney, president of the Amherst Area Amateur Astronomers Association, explained that the Leonid shower was one of the most beautiful natural phenomenon, "It's a natural phenomenon. Some people look at waterfalls, other people look at women in bikinis. I can't account for human taste. Why look at it? . . . Because it's there."
Meteors are basically space debris, in this case the debris that is responsible for Leonids is that left by Comet Tempel-Tuttle. The meteor shower is expected to occur between 11:45 p.m. and 1:30 a.m. EST Saturday and Sunday.
Marsden said that since the Tempel-Tuttle passed through the solar system in 1998, it is probable that as the years go by, the concentration of the meteors will decrease. "The surprise is that we are already eight going on nine years after the comet was here," he said.
Alan MacRobert, editor of Sky & Telescope magazine said that the ideal place for stargazers this weekend would be New England, eastern New York and eastern Canada, "The place you really want to be is westernmost Europe or England," he said. "They'll be ideally placed."
But weather could be a dampener this weekend because the National Weather Service has predicted partly cloudy skies in southern New England.