Wanna see a meteor shower? I know it’s cold, but you don’t have to go anywhere for this one — just check out this video.
Long-time imager and Astronomy contributor John Chumack, who lives in Dayton, Ohio, had one of his wide-field video cameras (Northeast SkyCam #2) pointed at the sky during the peak of the Quadrantid meteor shower January 3. He then condensed nearly 7.5 hours of time into a 4-second movie (6 seconds, counting the title). In that short time, John’s camera caught dozens of meteors streaking overhead.
Astronomers named this event the Quadrantid meteor shower before they formalized our current constellations. The name, therefore, refers to a now-extinct constellation, Quadrans Muralis, which lies near Boötes the Herdsman. In fact, during the 3rd second of the movie, Boötes’ brightest star, Arcturus (Alpha [α] Boötis), appears at lower-left and rises higher.
Want to see more of John’s work? Go to www.galacticimages.com.