The Perseid meteor shower will peaks on Friday night and it's one of the best shows of the year. But can we see it? Because watchers will have to dodge a full moon at the shower's peak on Friday and Saturday.
If you really want to see the shower, then you should go out Wednesday and Thursday a.m. to avoid the glare from the moon. Knowing the radiant and time and date of the peak (this year predicted for 2 a.m. EDT on the night of August 12 and13) lets us determine how to best observe the Perseid.
Normally the best time would be after local midnight (1 a.m. Local Time) on the night of the peak; after midnight because we sweep up more meteoroids on the leading side of Earth as it circles the sun.
The moon sets about 50 minutes earlier each night so that tonight (Aug. 10 and 11), for example, it sets at 4 a.m., so that we will have a short period between moonset and morning twilight which is also reasonably close to the peak of the meteors.
You might also want to allow at least 20 minutes for your eyes to become fully dark adapted. Dress warmly, even in summer.
According to scientist, we can also watch the shower at dawn. "The best time to look is during the hours before dawn especially on Saturday morning, August 13th," writes Tony Phillips, an astronomer who manages the Science News page at NASA's website. "The full Moon will be relatively low, and the meteor rate should be peaking at that time."
The Perseid shower is one of the most widely viewed meteor showers of the year. The meteors are bits of debris that comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle casts off when it approaches the sun, warms, and begins shedding its dust and gas. The shower gets its name from the constellation Perseus, which appears to be the point in the sky from which the shower originates.
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