Meteor showers expected during early hours of Friday

AMMAN — The Kingdom is set to witness meteor showers during the early hours of Friday with 20-100 meteors potentially showering the night sky per hour, producing some colourful and fiery streaks, according to the Observatory of Wadi Rum, Um Al Dami, cited by the Jordan News Agency, Petra.

Astronomer Imad Mujahid from the observatory, said that during dawn hours on Friday, meteor showers are expected according to previous astronomical observations, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

Mujahid added that Comet Thatcher is the source of the meteor showers, as when comets travel around the sun, the dust they emit gradually spreads into a dusty trail around their orbits.

April 22 of every year the Earth passes through these debris trails, which allow the bits to collide with Earth’s atmosphere where they disintegrate to create fiery and colourful streaks in the sky, which is also called Lyra, according to Petra. 

Meteors, which are also called shooting stars, are microscopic earth atoms that float in space, said Mujahid. 

Mujahid pointed out that meteors are expected to crash into Earth’s atmosphere at a speed of 49 kilometres per second. As a result of this high speed, the Earth’s atoms are trapped in the Earth’s gaseous atmosphere, resulting in high heat generation, which glows and appears in the form of fiery and colourful streaks in the sky for a while and then disappears.

However, meteors begin to burn at an altitude of 120 kilometres above the Earth’s surface and then burn and turn into ash at an altitude of 60 kilometres, according to Mujahid. 

Therefore, meteors will not reach the surface of Earth at all, Mujahid said, noting that if any meteors reached the surface they will be in the form of very small atoms.