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[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]early risers watch out for this
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[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]April 17, 2009: Picture this: It's 4:30 in the morning. You're up and out before the sun. Steam rises from your coffee cup, floating up to the sky where a silent meteor streaks through a crowd of stars. A few minutes later it happens again, and again. A meteor shower is underway.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]One of the streaks leads to the eastern horizon. There, just above the tree line, Venus and the crescent Moon hover side by side, so close together they almost seem to touch. Suddenly, Venus wavers, winks, and disappears. [/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]All of this is about to happen--for real.[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Right: A Venus-Moon conjunction photographed Monika Landy-Gyebnar of Balatonakarattya, Hungary, on Dec. 1, 2008. [Larger image][/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]On Wednesday morning, April 22nd, Earth will pass through a stream of comet dust, giving rise to the annual Lyrid meteor shower. At the same time, the crescent Moon and Venus will converge for a close encounter in the eastern sky. Viewed from some parts of the world, the Moon will pass directly in front of Venus, causing Venus to vanish.[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]The source of the meteor shower is Comet Thatcher. Every year in late April, Earth passes through the comet's trail of debris. Flakes of comet dust, most no bigger than grains of sand, strike Earth's atmosphere traveling 110,000 mph and disintegrate as fast streaks of light. A typical Lyrid shower produces 10 to 20 meteors per hour over the northern hemisphere, not an intense display. Occasionally, however, Earth passes through a dense region of the comet's tail and rates increase five- to ten-fold. In 1982, observers counted 90 Lyrids per hour. Because Thatcher's tail has never been mapped in detail, the outbursts are unpredictable and could happen again at any time. The probabilities are highest during the dark hours before sunrise on April 22nd.[/FONT]

 

Thanks for that Walnut, I hope it's clear enough to see it. You're well rewarded for your early rising judging by some of the photos you put up around the forum.

 

Well out I went 4 am clear sky location for sighting planned loaded up tripod,camera took the dog and set off to the park were I would have a better view of the horizon and guess what it went misty couldn't see a thing.Entertained the beast for an hour went back home were it was clear again saddled up and went for a ride to catch the sunrise,clear again through town looking like it was colouring up for a nice sunrise the further I went the foggier it was I kept thinking it will clear any moment but it did not,the only compensation was 2 hares running towards me in the fog and got very close before spotting me and shooting off into the fields,sun just braking through now I am home should be a nice day.

 

OK Walnut, know this will sound really stupid but....

how come the comet trail happens every year? I thought comets were (whats the word?)...unpredictable....something like that. Do we know which planet they come from? They do come from planets don't they? Your pic has been removed now so I can't see it but wouldn't know what to look for otherwise, I love the info and pics you give on here and one day, or night, may actually see something!

cheers

 

Sandra,Comets are believed to reside in an area way outside our solar system called the"Oort cloud" a spherical shell of more than 100 billion comets surrounds the solar system at a distance of 75,000–150,000 astronomical units (1 astronomical unit, or AU, being the mean distance from the earth to the sun). While the comets move very slowly in this huge storage cloud, a passing star may change their orbits enough to force some of them into the inner part of the solar system.The comets are then captured by our suns gravity and make periodical visits in their orbits round our sun ,some comets are "short term" and are captured close to the sun melting and blowing them appart forming vast swathes of debris,it's these clouds of particles we pass through annually on our orbit around the sun they give us our regular meteor showers.Some comets take a long time to do one orbit Halley's takes 86 years, one comet that passed by in 1996 comey Hyakutake (which had a tail 354million miles long)will not be back for another29,500 years so don't hold your breath.