Two Meteor Showers To Coincide For Spectacular Display

Two meteor showers will peak simultaneously in the early morning hours of Wednesday. The Southern Delta Aquariid and Alpha Capricornid showers will be visible without significant interference from a waxing quarter moon. Thaddeus LaCoursiere, planetarium program coordinator at the Bell Museum in St. Paul, Minnesota, noted that each shower could produce up to a dozen meteors per hour under dark skies, adding up to a significant display. The best time to view the celestial event is during the pre-dawn hours when the moon is low in the sky. No special equipment is needed, just looking for “flashes of light in the night sky,” as LaCoursiere described these “very nice classic meteor showers.” The next major meteor shower, the Perseids, will peak in mid-August. (Newser)