meteor showers are spectacular right now

by Glander 11 Replies latest jw friends

  • WTWizard
    WTWizard

    I know a thing or two about "light pollution". This refers to a city where there are so many lights, many of them upward shining from billboards, that it washes out the natural sky. This is fine around Christmas time--that is, if you really want to see Christmas lights. But, if you are looking for stars or planets (or meteors), such pollution is not as fine. The good news is that it requires energy to be in place--the minute they get a blackout, all the stars become visible provided it is clear.

    Some good places to view these things include the mountains of the Rockies, parts of northern New England (especially in higher elevations and away from the coast), Canada away from the big cities, and in rural Mexico. If we ever start getting regular fake energy crisis related blackouts, you might just start seeing stars in New York City at night. You could also see them in South America--northern Chile, the dryest place in the world, is prime. Hawaii is another great place to see stars. Africa, with all its problems, has some excellent star gazing conditions. Obviously, places like China and Japan are too densely populated with cities.

    Another excellent place to see stars is on any island, preferably with mountains, in the southern hemisphere and is some distance from any major land masses. You will even get to see the Southern Cross, which you cannot see in the northern hemisphere. And, Antarctica is probably one of the finest places to view stars.

  • kurtbethel
    kurtbethel

    I was with a friend stargazing on Monday night, north of Palomar mountain in California. We saw several early Perseid fireballs throughout the night. I can only imagine how spectacular it would be at peak. I am too close to the coast in San Diego county, so it has been overcast at night and I have not seen any since then.

    Usually one heads for the mountains or desert around here for great sky viewing, though a couple years ago I got exceptional clear skies within sound of the Pacific ocean surf. This was at a Campground about 30 miles west of Santa Barbara. I was amazed to see a night sky like that on the coast.

    I have seen the night sky in Africa, with our own lovely LouBelle, in the Drakensberg mountains. It was a black velvet sky that I have rarely seen in North America and the southern cross was visible, along with many other stars never seen this far north.

    One of my photos.

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