One night in 1983, two astronomers using the world’s first space telescope spotted a strange hunk of space rock that looked like a star. It was almost five kilometres wide and calculated to be a “potentially hazardous” near-Earth object whose orbit around the sun grazes by our planet every 50 years.
So began an astronomical inquiry into the parent object of a famous meteor shower: the Geminids. The bright shooting stars that stemmed from that object now grace Earth’s nighttime sky every mid-December—just in time for making Christmas wishes.
As meteors go, the Geminids are considered a top-shelf light show by astronomers, rivalling the peerless Perseids in August. Already underway this year, the Geminids will peak on the night of Dec. 14 and continue until Christmas Eve. Under ideal conditions, an observer might expect to see 120 meteors per hour, but because the full moon falls on Dec. 15, in the thick of the peak period, they will undoubtedly be muted somewhat….