Astroblog: Australian Perseid Meteor Shower

Friday, August 05, 2016

Australian Perseid Meteor Shower - Morning August 13, 2016


Perseid radiant as seen from Darwin at 5:00 am local time, August the 13th, looking north. Click to embiggen.	Perseid radiant as seen from Brisbane at 5:00 am local time, August the 13th, looking north. Note how much lower the radiant is than in Darwin.

The Perseid Meteor Shower runs from July 17–August 24, and peaks on between 11:00 pm Friday August 12 - 1:30 am Saturday August 13 AEST (August 12, 13:00h to 15:30 UT). See the International Meteor Calendar for 2016 for further details.

Despite this being a quite reasonable meteor shower in the northern hemisphere, for most of Australia the radiant is below the horizon, and only the very occasional meteor will be seen shooting up from the northern horizon. Only observers in northern Australia (at the latitude of Brisbane or further north) will have decent rates.

This is a good year, while the peak occurs before the radiant rises (or at least is at its closest to the horizon) in Australia, it still occurs reasonably close to radiant rise and there is no Moon to ruin the shower. Also this years peak is higher than usual (with a ZHR of 150 meteors per hour predicted).

However, these ZHR predictions are ideal rates for sites with the meteor radiant directly overhead, under the darkest possible skies with nothing obscuring the sky. From Australia, we will see much lower rates than these ideal ones. Anyone south of Brisbane will see only the occasional meteor, say maybe one or two per hour (or less), the further north of Brisbane you are, the more meteors you will see.

You can check predictions for your local area at the NASA meteor flux estimator (choose 7 Perseids and 12-13 or 13-14 August 2016).

People around the latitude of Darwin have the best chance of seeing meteors, possibly as many as one every 2 minutes at the peak (see table below). Next is places with the latitude of Cairns (around a meteor every 3 minutes), then with the latitude of Mackay (like Port Headland and Mt Isa), and the places with the latitude of Alice Springs (again,see table below).

To see the meteors, you will need to be up from around 3:00 am local time on the 12th, 13th or 14th (yes, a really horrible hour of the morning), with best views 4:00 am-5:30 am on the 13th. The meteor shower will be located due North, with the radiant just above the northern horizon (see charts above). Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.

When you get up, allow at least 5 minutes for your eyes to adjust, and be patient, it may be several minutes before you are rewarded with you first meteor, then a couple will come along in quick succession. Choose a viewing spot where you can see a large swathe of sky without trees or buildings getting in the way, or with street lights getting in your eyes. The darker the spot the better (but do be sensible, don't choose a spot in an unsalubrious park for example).

A lawn chair or something similar will make your observing comfortable (or a picnic rug spread on the ground and a nice pillow), and having a Thermos of hot coffee, tea or chocolate to swig while watching will increase your comfort. (Here's some hints on dark adaptation of your eyes so you can see meteors better).

The following table show the predicted peak rates at around 5 am local time on the mornings of the 12th, 13 and 14th of August for a number of cities under dark sky conditions. Rates will be similar at the same latitude as these cities, and rates will be intermediate at spots between these cities.

Town	Morning August 12	Morning August 13	Morning August 14
Alice Springs	8 meteors/hr	12 meteors/hr	7 meteors/hr
Brisbane	5 meteors/hr	7 meteors/hr	4 meteors/hr
Cairns	15 meteors/hr	23 meteors/hr	12 meteors/hr
Darwin	19 meteors/hr	28 meteors/hr	16 meteors/hr
Mackay	11 meteors/hr	16 meteors/hr	9 meteors/hr

Rates on the morning of the 15th are similar to that of the 14th. Note, those of you who have Stellarium, in version 13 they have added meteor shower radiants (rates set in the planets dialogue, F4). However while the radiants are shown, the simulated meteors come from random points in the sky, not the radiants.

Labels: Meteors