A meteor shower is a celestial event in which a number of meteors are observed to radiate from one point in the night sky. These meteors are caused by streams of cosmic debris called meteoroids entering Earth's atmosphere at extremely high speeds on parallel trajectories. Most meteors are smaller than a grain of sand, so almost all of them disintegrate and never hit the Earth's surface. Intense or unusual meteor showers are known as meteor outbursts and meteor storms, which may produce greater than 1,000 meteors an hour.
Read more about Meteor Shower: The Radiant Point, The Origin of Meteoroid Streams, The Dynamical Evolution of Meteoroid Streams, Extraterrestrial Meteor Showers
Famous quotes containing the words meteor and/or shower:
“The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill,
And off a blossom in mid-air stands still.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“Mix salt and sand, and it shall puzzle the wisest of men, with his mere natural appliances, to separate all the grains of sand from all the grains of salt; but a shower of rain will effect the same object in ten minutes.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)