News tagged with geminids

The Geminids are a meteor shower caused by the object 3200 Phaethon, which is thought to be a Palladian asteroid. This would make the Geminids, together with the Quadrantids, the only major meteor showers not originating from a comet. The meteors from this shower are slow moving, can be seen in December and usually peak around the 13th - 14th of the month, with the date of highest intensity being the morning of the 14th. The shower is thought to be intensifying every year and recent showers have seen 120–160 meteors per hour under optimal conditions, generally around 2am to 3am local time. Geminids were first observed only 150 years ago, much more recently than other showers such as the Perseids and Leonids[citation needed].