Welcome! My name is Janine and in this video we will learn about the meteor shower known
as the Geminids which occurs during the first two weeks of December. The peak of the shower
usually happens between December 13th to 14th, even into the 15th. We're going to examine
the cause of this meteor shower and get practice with identifying the constellation of Gemini
since that is the radiant for this meteor shower. If you're new to this channel be sure
to hit the subscribe button and click the bell for notifications about all new videos.
If you want to learn more about stargazing be sure to visit my new website.
We've got some freebies there as well as new seasonal classes that have just been released.
The Geminid Meteor Shower is a great meteor shower to observe because it's fairly consistent
each year with the amount of meteors that can be seen. This shower is unique in the sense that
it is associated with an asteroid instead of a comet. As a child of the 80s, when I think of
asteroids I think of this atari game that I played growing up. But in reality this is what an asteroid
would look like as it's traveling through the system. When objects travel around the sun as
you can see right here, they emit dust and gas. It creates this dusty trail in their orbits. Then
the Earth passes through this orbit and the particles from this dust trail and enter our atmosphere.
They burn up and they create these beautiful streaks across the sky. Let's dig a little bit
more into the asteroid known as Phaethon 3200. It's orbital period is that of 1.4 years.
Here you can see we have an image from the Arecibo Observatory of what 3200 Phaethon
looks like. This image was taken, of course, before the collapse of the Arecibo Observatory.
If we look here, we can see the path of this asteroid as it goes around the sun. Remember
whenever the earth crosses through its debris that's when we start to see the beautiful meteors
in the shower. Just to review what a meteor is, it's an object that glows due to friction
while traveling through the Earth's atmosphere. It appears as a streak of light in the sky.
Now I am most likely not going to be able to see this meteor shower when I go out tonight, but
I've been going out for the past few weeks and I still am able to capture a few meteors each night
that's most likely coming from this particular asteroid. There is a lot we have been learning
about 3200 Phaethon particularly from the Parker Solar Probe. Now, the Parker Solar Probe is NASA's
mission in which the this probe is going around the sun at very high speeds. In fact the
Parker Solar Probe is the fastest man-made object in the universe at this moment in time. As this
probe is slingshotting around the sun, we have some different instruments that are able to measure
some phenomena that we see occur around the sun and this is one particular phenomenon we're
seeing. So this picture was taken by The Whisper. The Whisper is an instrument that records
visible light images on the Parker Solar Probe. What you're seeing right here,
where these dots are marking, is this captured the asteroid dust trail that is been created by
3200 Phaethon. If you want to learn more about Parker Solar Probe NASA has a
great website about it. It shows you where its position is. It's pretty amazing that we've
been able to record this dust trail from this particular probe. Here's another image I found
that kind of shows you the movement of this asteroid among the stars and here's another
image we have. This is what it looks like as it has traveled through our own skies. As the Earth is
traveling through the debris field what we end up getting are these particular streaks in the sky
or it may look like something like this. I have observed the Geminid Meteor Shower before
Two years ago I was lucky enough to see it with perfectly clear skies in Hawai'i.
It was the most amazing celestial event I've ever seen in my lifetime.
Usually I don't get to always see those amazing celestial events like meteor showers or lunar
eclipses because the weather may not be great, but this particular one was amazing. I saw
some huge streaks across the sky. I stayed out for over an hour and saw at least 30 different meteors
that particular night. How many however many meteor showers you are going to see really varies
depending upon where you are in the globe. Let's quickly explore the difference between meteors,
meteoroids, meteorites, and meteor showers. A meteor is when an object glows due to friction
while traveling through the Earth's atmosphere. However, a meteoroid is when it's traveling through
space and it burns up on our atmosphere. It's a meteor, but when it hits the ground it becomes a
meteorite. A meteor shower are celestial events. When the earth passes through
this path of cosmic dust and debris that could be left over from a comet, or in this case an asteroid,
they're often named after the place they originate from. So for example, the Geminids
originate from the constellation Gemini. If you were to take a bunch of pictures of meteors
throughout the night during the Geminid meteor shower and you combined all those images what
you would find is that it appears to originate from this particular point in the sky, or in this
in this case the Gemini constellation. Here's another picture that shows you
the radiant. This picture was taken over the course of a few hours. You can
tell that because you trace these streaks back to their point of origin and that is called
the radiant. So the radiant is where it appears that these objects are coming from. If we
examine this a little bit closer, this is an idea of what a radiant is like. So immediate meteors
from our perspective will appear randomly in the sky, but if you trace them back to that common
origin point that's called a radius. We often name the radian after which constellation
it is in. This gives you the example of the perseus meteor shower or the perseids.
This is where the radiant would be. For Gemini, this is where it would be located near Pollux
which is one of the bright starts. Here we have Pollux and here we have Castor. So it appears to
originate from that point in the sky. Here's another example of pictures that have been
taken over the course of the night. When you observe you can trace all these points of light
back to one single point. That's pretty amazing. That's how meteor showers are different. It's
an actual event as opposed to an object like a meteor, meteorite, or meteoroid.
Now let's get some quick practice with how to identify Gemini in the sky. Remember you don't
necessarily have to see this constellation to see meteors, because the meteors will appear randomly
throughout the sky. However, since it is the Geminid Meteor Shower, it is a good idea just to learn a
little bit about this star pattern. So Gemini is one of those few constellations that somewhat
looks like what it's supposed to represent, which is a set of twins. Here is the official star
map released by the International Astronomical Union. You can see it's surrounded by
lots of bright stars. The way I find Gemini is to use Orion. I use Orion to guide me towards where
Gemini is. So if we have some pictures, here. there's a few constellations you can see. Gemini is located
right smack in the middle of this constellation. You can even see a meteor going through it. So this
is where gemini is located, you have the bright star Pollux, and the bright star Castor.
The way I remember it is that Castor seems to have a cast on his leg. At least a student came
up with that and taught that shortcut to me, so I share it with you. The other constellations
that we have here are Cancer, we have Canis Minor, and then Aruiga. If you want to learn more about
any of these constellations, be sure to go see those videos. So if we were to get a little bit
more practice with how to find Gemini, we can look for the Winter Hexagon Asterism.
This is a connection of bright stars that forms a hexagon shape and Gemini is a part of this.
I love this picture because it shows you where Orion is, right here, and how you can use
Rigel, the bright star of Orion, to draw a line up through Betelgeuse and it will lead you
right to where Gemini is. If we were to point out everything here, this is what we
have. We have Gemini, Auriga, Taurus, Orion, Canis Major, and Canis
Minor. So those are the constellations you want to look for when trying to find Gemini.
Thank you so much for watching! I wish you luck trying to observe the Geminid Meteor Shower.
I hope that the weather is on your side, because ultimately for you to be able to see this meteor
shower you definitely need clear skies. I am, of course, always going to recommend that you
seek out dark skies whenever you're trying to find the constellation because it will enhance your
stargazing experience. Gemini is a beautiful constellation. I love being able to find this one
in the sky and I'm lucky that in my lifetime I was able to see an amazing Geminid Meteor Shower.
I wish you luck trying to find this and I hope you have clear skies. Keep looking up!