Perseid Meteor Showers Northern Hemisphere Sky
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NORTHERN HEMISPHERE (CBSMiami) -- The Perseid meteor shower peaked on Thursday night into early Friday and is expected to be visible through Saturday.
The annual meteor shower, an August tradition, is named so because the meteors appear to emanate from the constellation Perseus, the Medusa-killing hero of Greek mythology.
This year, the meteor shower will be an "outburst" -- where nearly double the amount of meteors will illuminate the sky. The scattered specks of dust trailing the comet's wake flash as they enter the atmosphere at a mind-blowing 132,000 mph and burn up.
A meteor shower is a visible indicator of a comet's journey around the inner solar system. As comets enter the inner solar system, known as the perihelion passage, the sun's rays heat up their frozen surfaces, in turn, releasing trillions of small dust particles. When the Earth crosses the trail left by the comets, they become visible.
In the Christian calendar, the Perseids are symbolic of the returning tears of San Lawrence. He was burnt alive on a gridiron. The canonical date of his martyrdom was 10 August 258 AD.
The last Perseids outburst was in 2009.
