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The Lyrid meteor shower is coming up tonight, but spotting a meteor could be difficult for many observers.
Meteor observers can expect about 18 meteors per hour at the height of the show. But the bright moon, a gibbous in decline two days after the full moon, could erase some of these "shooting stars". Seeing the meteors tonight will require work and a lot of luck.
The meteor shower Lyrid comes from comet C / 1861 G1 (Thatcher), which revolves around the Sun every 415 years. She spent the last time on Earth in 1861. But in her wake, the comet left a cloud of dust. When the Earth enters the clouds, the particles of dust that enter the atmosphere create streaks of light. The name of the meteor shower, the Lyrids, comes from the Lyra constellation whose meteors once seemed to come from. Now that the constellations have standard limits, the radiation of the shower (the position in the sky from which the meteors seem to arrive) is actually in the Hercules constellation.
Although they are not as bright as other showers like Perseids and Geminids, the Lyrids are the first recorded meteor shower, reported Sky and Telescope last year. The rain occasionally lights up to 100 meteors per hour, although the next big explosion probably does not happen for two decades.
The shower will not be easy either this year. Space.com reports that the moon will rise shortly after the radiation of meteorite rain, and the bright moon will take away some of the meteors. But rain is important for some observers, as it is the first in a series of near-monthly meteorite rains leading to the Perseids in August.
If you are trying to see the Lyrids this year, it is best to dress warmly, find the darkest place possible and wait 20 to 30 minutes for your eyes to adjust to the darkness.
Good supervision of the sky! I hope you see a meteor or two.
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