Week of December 25-31, 2011: The First Meteor Shower of 2012 by Dennis Mammana on Creators.com

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Week of December 25-31, 2011: The First Meteor Shower of 2012

If you missed the Geminids meteor shower of mid-December — and most of us did because of bright moonlight — you've got another chance. Not with the Geminids, of course; they won't return until next December, but with the Quadrantid shower, which peaks on the night and morning of January 3/4, 2012.

Never heard of it? I'm not surprised; few beginning stargazers have. By anyone's definition, the Quadrantids is an unusual meteor shower.

First off, there's its name. A meteor shower is usually designated for the constellation out of which its meteors seem to radiate. But not the Quadrantids. Its name comes from an obsolete constellation of the 19th century — Quadrans Muralis — located just north of Bootes. The International Astronomical Union removed it in 1922 when the organization adopted the current list of 88 constellations.

Another odd fact about the Quadrantids is that no one seems to know its origin. Most meteor showers are caused by dusty particles boiled off of passing comets, but astronomers have yet to find any such comet that matches the orbits of the Quadrantid meteoroids. So the puzzle remains.

Still another unusual fact about this shower is that, while most others can be watched for days, this one lasts for only a few hours. So with the Quadrantids, if you miss the few hours around its peak, you pretty much miss the entire thing.

The 2012 Quadrantids should provide a pretty good show to North American stargazers, however.

It will reach its official peak at about 11 p.m. PST on Jan. 3 (2 a.m. EST on Jan. 4), and the best times to view it are during the few hours around that time. Now the moon may still appear in your sky, but it should be setting lower in the west and provide only a little interference. Astronomers predict an hourly rate of 100 to 120 meteors might be visible to viewers away from city lights, and that's every bit as good as a moonless Geminid shower of mid-December.

The Quadrantids appear to radiate from a point just north of Bootes, high in the eastern sky after midnight. Bootes, the herdsman, looks more like a kite with the bright yellowish-orange star Arcturus marking its tail. One can also imagine that it's shaped like an arrow, which conveniently aims toward the shower's radiant.

But that's not where you want to look. Remember, just like with every other meteor shower, you need to take in the entire sky with your eyes, and the best way to do that is to lie back on a sleeping bag or lawn chair.

Meteors will appear everywhere, but you'll know if they're true Quadrantids by tracing their paths backwards. If these appear to converge near the radiant, their meteors are indeed part of the shower. If they don't, they're just "sporadic" meteors caused by the many random dust particles scattered around our part of the solar system.

2012 is filled with amazing celestial events you won't want to miss, so my recommendation is this: Bundle up and head out to a dark-sky site for a meteor shower to celebrate the beginning of an exciting new year!

Visit Dennis Mammana at www.dennismammana.com. To read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.