Will there be a new meteor shower on the night of May 30–31? There’s only one way to find out.

Meteor observing can be relaxing and enjoyable — and potentially dramatic. Yet the only equipment needed for serious meteor watching is your eyes and a modest amount of patience. Most of the annual meteor showers are fairly predictable, but the main attraction is that it’s impossible to predict what you will see. Occasionally you might be surprised by a dazzling fireball or the brilliant flash of a bolide.

Colorful Perseid fireball
A colorful Perseid fireball blazes during the 2016 shower. We’ll have to wait for the night of May 30–31 to see if the possible new meteor shower will produce similar fireballs . . . or any meteors at all.
Siaraduz / CC BY-SA 4.0

During the overnight hours of May 30–31 things might turn exciting.

In the fall of 1995, Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 (SW3) fractured into several pieces and left a trail of fragments in its wake. Should the Earth encounter this stream of debris, a sudden outburst of meteors might erupt, ranking with some of our richest annual displays (Geminids and Perseids). There’s even a small chance that something extraordinary — perhaps a full-scale storm of meteors — might take place.

Or perhaps, visually, nothing at all will happen.

Meteor shower? Or not?

Astronomers worldwide have since investigated the prospects of Earth’s passage through this swarm of freshly ejected material. While some think no meteor shower of significance will take place on the night of May 30–31, others suggest our planet will have a direct interaction with the comet debris.

However, the occurrence of such a meteor shower or outburst requires a rather unique set of circumstances:

  • Typically, meteor showers are caused by tiny dust or sand-grain-size particles that trail behind a comet thanks, in part, to solar radiation pressure. But in this case the comet bits are probably larger: pebble- or nugget-sized.
  • When SW3 fractured, these larger particles may have been expelled at unusually high velocities. Such material would not be affected by solar radiation pressure and would tend to migrate forward of the comet’s direction of motion around the Sun, ultimately colliding with Earth. 

Unfortunately, such calculations are fraught with uncertainties. 

Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 breaks up
The Hubble Space Telescope caught Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 in the process of breaking up in 2006. As the top images show, the fragments themselves fragmented.
NASA / ESA / H. Weaver (JHU / AP) / M. Jäger / G. Rhemann

In the best-case scenario, it could result in a bevy of slow, bright meteors, glowing with a ruddy or orange tint, falling at the rate of dozens or hundreds per hour.

On the other hand, perhaps we’ll encounter very few comet particles — or maybe none at all. Another factor is that because the meteors will enter our atmosphere at a very slow speed — 16 km/s (36,000 mph) — they’ll be very faint or not visible at all to the naked eye. Since we’ve never encountered this swarm before, we can’t say for sure exactly what to expect.

When and where to look

If a display does materialize, meteors would appear to dart from a point several degrees northwest of the brilliant orange star Arcturus, in the constellation of Boötes, the Herdsman.

Radiant diagram for possible May 30th meteor shower
Should a meteor shower materialize on the night of May 30–31, they'll appear to emanate from a point called the radiant, which is in the constellation Boötes.
S&T Diagram / Gregg Dinderman

The shower likely will last only a few hours. As to when it should reach its peak, for those in the Pacific Time Zone this should be around 10 p.m. on May 30th; for those in the Eastern Time Zone that translates to about 1 a.m. on May 31st. Sadly, for the Pacific Northwest, the twilight sky will probably be too bright, precluding a view of any possible display.

What do the pundits think?

To provide readers with the very best assessment as to what we might expect to see, we consulted a number of well-known meteor experts. 

Unfortunately, there’s no real consensus.

Two independent studies — one from Germany and the other from Japan — both confidently predict that significant meteor activity will result from the breakup of Comet SW3. 

But French meteor expert, Jérémie Vaubaillon of the Institut de mécanique céleste et de calcul des éphémérides (IMCCE) isn’t so sure: “I confirm that the shower is possible and plausible,” he writes, “but it is the level of the shower that is highly uncertain. We might see a storm, but frankly, we might also see a whole bunch of . . . not much!”

“This is going to be an all or nothing event,” comments William Cooke, manager of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office. “Personally, I remain skeptical that an outburst will occur. But I also could very well be wrong.”

Paul Wiegert of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Western Ontario registers a similar view: “I’ve quickly re-examined some of the modelling and don’t think the (comet) break-up could produce high enough speeds to reach Earth, but this process is very poorly understood . . . so as the song goes, ‘que sera sera.’ We just have to wait and see.”

In 1998, meteor astronomer David Asher developed a “dust trail” model of how meteoroid streams in space evolve. “There aren’t any previous examples for us to calibrate this year’s prediction,” he says, in anticipating what might happen this month. “An analogy with Biela’s Comet and the 1885 Andromedid storm might give us hope; also, the fact that comet SW3 underwent a major disruption at its 1995 return. If there’s an outburst, the meteors should be bright.”

A similar upbeat prediction comes from Russian dynamicist Mikhail Maslov who also predicts the meteors will be of “higher-than-average brightness.” He feels hourly rates could reach 600 to 700. “However,” he adds, “considering that in 1995 the comet broke into several parts, the real activity could be higher.”

So, will we see any meteors on the night of May 30–31? “We'll soon know . . .” says comet fragmentation expert Zdenek Sekanina.

Good luck and clear skies!


For more information, see Contributing Editor Joe Rao’s article on page 34 in the May 2022 issue of Sky & Telescope.


Comments


Image of mary beth

mary beth

May 30, 2022 at 5:59 pm

Very interesting, thank you! On a sidenote I am a Rao as well. My maternal grandmother from Potenza Italy was Christina Rao.

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Michael

May 31, 2022 at 12:25 am

8 meteors seen in a partly cloudy sky in a fifteen minute span between 11pm-11:15pm, CST (0400-0415 UT). They could be traced back to the Arcturus-Hercules region of the sky. Seems like increased activity. Not storming yet.

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Michael

May 31, 2022 at 1:59 am

I meant to say CDT, not CST.

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Michael

May 31, 2022 at 1:58 am

39 probable shower members seen from 11:00 pm CDT (0400 UT) to 12:45 am CDT (0545 UT). I was only observing for 1.5 hours of that time and I was hampered by partly cloudy skies, ranging from 20% to 50% cloud cover. Meteors that were counted seemed to be traced back to the Arcturus-Serpens Caput region. Rural sky. No storm, but a nice shower.

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bob kelly

May 31, 2022 at 1:59 am

Bob Kelly, Ardsley, NY
No meteor storm, at least not that I saw. Could see stars magnitude +4 and brighter with local light pollution. Some high clouds came in waves from time to time, especially 12 midnight to 12:30. More high clouds, with only the brightest stars visible from 1:10 to 1:25+
Observed from 10:30 to 1:25. 10 minute break about 11:50pm.
Watched the part of the sky from Vega to the Big Dipper and from straight overhead to 30 degrees above the north north eastern horizon.
8 meteors in total, 7 from the general direction of Arcturus and one from the east. Two were bright and slow at magnitude -2 and lasted the length of the handle of the Big Dipper. One mag +1, rest were mag +2 and +3.
Observed three satellites from NW to SE early and one going from S to N about 12:18am.
I'll see in the morning if the occasional photos I took with the Canon XS caught anything.

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Mike T

May 31, 2022 at 2:36 am

A tremendous shower here from the northern outskirts of Albuquerque, NM (mag 5 skies only to my north). Seeing was fair at best but transparency was excellent. I began observing at 9:30 pm MDT and was treated to my first two very dim “SW3’s” at 9:36 pm (magnitude 3 at best, maybe dimmer; my eyes were still adjusting). While wondering if most of the SW3’s would be this dim, I was surprised by a relatively bright mag 0 member a few minutes later, and that was soon followed by yet another nearly point-on radiant member.

From 9:30 pm until 12:03 am MDT, I observed 86 meteors, of which 5 were sporadics. Among SW3's were 6 fireballs (-7, -6, -5 and the remainder were -4)... each a brilliant golden color I can hardly compare with other meteor showers. Most had wakes but not persistent trains (at least not lasting more than about 2 seconds). The -7 was at 11:23 pm MDT.

While not scientific, I estimated that the main peak was at about 10:36pm MDT; and a brief sub-peak arrived at around 11:25 pm MDT.

Thanks to all the number crunchers that wouldn’t let this outburst go unnoticed!

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antlers

May 31, 2022 at 10:54 am

From Outer Banks NC my observations very much agree with yours. Observed from 11:30 PM to 1:30 AM, but saw a few fireballs just glancing at the sky earlier in the evening. Didn't count but saw dozens of meteors from the radiant, with large fraction 0 mag or better. Saw two very bright orange with trails, but both of those seemed to be just north-to-south rather than from radiant?

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Anthony Barreiro

May 31, 2022 at 1:29 pm

Here in San Francisco we had clear skies. From Bernal Hill, with the crest of the hill between me and the worst of the light pollution (and boy it is bad) limiting visual magnitude was 4 directly overhead. I observed from 2130 to 2230 PDT (0430 to 0530 UTC). Astronomical dusk was at 2215. Between 2217 and 2223 I saw two faint meteors and one slightly brighter meteor, all radiating from near Arcturus.

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OwlEye

May 31, 2022 at 2:16 pm

I had a one-hour window of somewhat hazy sky between two lines of thunderstorms here in De Soto, Kansas, that just happened to be centered upon 05:30 UT. The first tau Herculid appeared at 05:10, three degrees SE of Arcturus, and 4th magnitude. The second flashed at 05:22, five degrees east E of Arcturus, and 2.5 magnitude. The third shot at 05:28, ~ five degrees S of the keystone of Hercules and was 3rd magnitude. The final Herculid flew at 05:53, seven degrees S of Alphecca in Corona Borealis, and was also third magnitude.

These four, slow-moving meteors all lead back to the radiant in Bootes, close to the star 9 Bootis (The 9 Bootids?). The farther each meteor was from the radiant, the longer their trains appeared.

It was a very satisfying hour, seeing these pieces of 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann end their orbits around the sun in the midnight skies above the windy plains of eastern Kansas!!

Regards,
Doug Z

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MarkInSocorro

May 31, 2022 at 2:24 pm

I saw 28 meteors with a radiant near Arcturus from 9:36 to 10:36 PM MDT from Socorro, NM with clear but slightly smoky skies. Four were mag 1 and brighter. Most were mag 4 to mag 3. All were remarkably similar in their slow speed. It was a nice shower.

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Donald Bruns

May 31, 2022 at 4:19 pm

I saw 6 meteor plus a few sporadics, from 4:45 UT to 5:30 UT. I drove an hour outside of San Diego to get mag 5.0 skies, no clouds. I saw two of the six just at 5:30, but decided there was no storm. Maybe I should have stayed a few more minutes.

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Mark-Adams

May 31, 2022 at 4:38 pm

I’ve been out observing the Tau Herculids (TAH), each of the past 3 nights (29, 30, & 31 May UT). Actually had pretty good weather for once.

On 29 May UT, I saw 1 TAH in 4+ hours; then 3 TAH in 4+ hours on 30 May UT. And last night (31 May UT) was hopefully going to be interesting & it was … Not an enormous outburst, but I observed 49 TAH in 5 hours, most (40) in the first 3 hours after evening twilight ended. My peak observed hourly rate was 17 TAH, including a -3 and -2.

Last night's sky was LM +6.0 until ~ 1h EDT when light mist / high humidity dropped the transparency to LM +5.6 over the last couple hours. The “outburst” was ramping down anyway, I think, and the radiant was getting low in the west.

The International Meteor Organization has a nice plot of the TAH data they’ve received.

I'd vote for declaring a victory for the meteor shower prediction team! Pretty cool. Not a huge outburst, but hourly rates as good as the Orionids & better than most other annual showers.

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Mark-Adams

May 31, 2022 at 4:41 pm

I’ve been out observing the Tau Herculids (TAH), each of the past 3 nights (29, 30, & 31 May UT) from a site ~10 miles west of Charlottesville, VA.

On 29 May UT, I saw 1 TAH in 4+ hours; then 3 TAH in 4+ hours on 30 May UT. And last night (31 May UT) was hopefully going to be interesting & it was … Not an enormous outburst, but I observed 49 TAH in 5 hours, most (40) in the first 3 hours after evening twilight ended. My peak observed hourly rate was 17 TAH, including a -3 and -2.

Last night's sky was LM +6.0 until ~ 1h EDT when light mist / high humidity dropped the transparency to LM +5.6 over the last couple hours. The “outburst” was ramping down anyway, I think, and the radiant was getting low in the west.

The International Meteor Organization has a nice plot of the TAH data they’ve received.

I'd vote for declaring a victory for the meteor shower prediction team! Pretty cool. Not a huge outburst, but hourly rates as good as the Orionids & better than most other annual showers.

-- Mark Adams

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StarChaser55

May 31, 2022 at 5:44 pm

I saw five from 04:23 UT to 4:51 UT on May 31st.
Four were small streaks, but one was a much brighter.
What struck me was the color of all five - orange. That could have been the effect of smoke from wildfires in New Mexico drifting over this way in west Texas (Davis Mountains), even though the skies appeared to be transparent.

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Joseph L. Montani

June 1, 2022 at 12:02 am

From home, I saw 8 shower meteors in 50 minutes from within the city of
Tucson ARIZONA / USA, between 9:38 and 10:24 PM MST (04:38 - 05:24 UTC).

These were the most unusual meteors I have ever seen: (1.) trails were
SHORT (or I mostly saw meteors bright enough to have terminal-bursts,
or -flares); (2.) color was RED, truly like a pyrotechnic red-orange;
(3.) meteors appeared to be rather SLOW (but, again, I observed well
before local Midnight, so the cometary / meteoritic dust had to catch
up with us). Sky transparency was excellent, and I could see stars
perhaps to magnitude 4.5 or 5, but the bright sky of the city prevents
doing better than that. No moon of course, and no clouds here in the
desert.

To sum up, the meteors I saw were SHORT, RED, and SLOW. I hope this
becomes a permanent, reliable meteor shower to enjoy and study in future
years also. All best, --Joseph L. Montani / Tucson AZ / W7DXW

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Anthony Barreiro

June 1, 2022 at 4:09 pm

Was this year's shower a one-time event, or is this now expected to be a significant annual shower?

Will the radiant remain near the border of Bootes and Canes Venatici, or was that also a special circumstance of this year's shower?

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Bob King

June 6, 2022 at 7:52 pm

Hi Anthony,
Special circumstances this year otherwise the radiant is in Hercules. This shower is very spotty. In some years, it produces nothing. Next time we'll see a significant shower from this comet is 2049.

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Steven Butchart

June 1, 2022 at 5:13 pm

I was lucky, I was on the verge of giving up when I saw about 5 a few seconds apart then about another 15 or so between Midnight and 1am. Not the storm I hoped for but lying out on a lounger on a warm evening staring at the stars and seeing some meteors is nothing to complain about.

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Martian-Bachelor

June 1, 2022 at 6:24 pm

I'm in Western Colorado, and clouds plagued me all night long, though there were some clear patches that drifted through.

I was late by ~10-15 minutes getting a polar alignment because I couldn't see Polaris yet due to the gunk, but once I did, in a single 30 second test shot to check for focus -- I have a "Low Light Ninja" f/1.4 wide angle lens that covers ~1/8th of the sky above the horizon -- I picked up three meteors, one quite faint.

I haven't worked out a radiant yet but they all converge, as others have said, towards somewhere S (not NW) of Arcturus. This was at 8:29:15 MST (~3:30 UT), which was before the start of astronomical night.

By the time I popped the card out of the camera, took it inside to see how good my focus was, and got back out to put it back in the camera and start taking exposures for real, the clouds were getting worse. And worse. Ugh.

The first nice stretch of (mostly) clear skies didn't appear until some 2½ hours later and lasted a little more than an hour. A quick look at some of the exposures during this time doesn't show anything going on then, so I think the prediction that the SW3 window would only be a few hours wide is probably correct, and my clear skies came through afterwards.

I'll be posting something sometime in the future at my website VISNS.NeoCities.org .

Thanks to all who have taken the time to post here.

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Martian-Bachelor

June 4, 2022 at 6:19 pm

As promised I've put a page up at VISNS.NeoCities.org/APNMS.htm , but I've only had time so far to work up one photo that had three meteors in it, which you can see for yourself.

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Randy Pfeiffer

June 1, 2022 at 6:49 pm

Observed the shower from Portal, AZ from 8:40 to 10:15 MST. It came in clusters with several-minute breaks between them. I saw 10 over the period, although I was taking breaks for equipment and nourishment. They were slow-moving, on the red side, and usually rather short. Two were longer and had weaving paths. Images showed more meteors in the same field of view than seen visually. Two successive images first show a meteor entering the atmosphere and burning up, followed by an image with only a feathery, spreading wisp of meteor dust lit by the sun. Combing the two shows the tail of dust mostly emanating from the point of greatest burning, with a bit of dust in the first image becoming apparent. 32-bit floating point FIT files and 16-bit TIF files are zipped to show the phenomenon; one image in each set has enhanced saturation. The faint tail is shown best in the 32-bit FIT files. The zip file contains eight images, size is about 150MB.
https://www.eldoradosoft.com/astronomy/images/meteor.zip

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Joseph L. Montani

June 1, 2022 at 10:34 pm

I remain a bit puzzled as to why this perhaps new SW3 shower is referred to as the Tau Herculids, considering that the observed radiant is well within Bootes and hence well away from Hercules. Granted, the fragmentation and disintegration event of the comet gave a kick to the cometary dust and other particles, and put them in a unique orbit to produce a distinct radiant from a previous radiant of the comet's meteoric progeny, but it's surprising that the apparent radiant could be so distant a previous one in Hercules. Perhaps someone here can point to a source where we may read a proposed explanation of this. Thanks! --Joe Montani / Tucson / W7DXW

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Bob King

June 4, 2022 at 11:54 am

Hi Joe,
You're correct. The meteoroids that created this specific shower were ejected forward of the comet's nucleus during the 1995 outburst rather than blown back into the tail by the solar wind. That shifted the radiant into Boötes. You'll find a little more information in this paper: https://imo.net/papers/Comet%2073PSchwassman-Wachman-Joe-Rao.pdf

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George Gliba

June 2, 2022 at 4:17 pm

From the clear transparent skies of Mathias, West Virginia with a LM=6.5 I was ale to
observe 20 Tau Hercules (THR), and 9 sporadic meteors from 11:36 PM to 12:36 AM EDT.
The average brightness for the THR was about 4th. One -3 fireball THR with a 3 minute
train was seen at 12:04 AM that was yellow-orange.

G.W. Gliba
Screech Owl Hill Observatory

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Wayne Wooten

June 6, 2022 at 4:45 pm

From the Airport Approach in Pensacola, Florida. Had team of five observers covering whole sky under T=3, with some clouds moving quickly through, but zenith (and radiant nearby) clear from 10 PM to midnight CDT on May 30th. In two hours, saw eight shower meteors and one sporadic. One -1 mag, 2 zero mag., 3 +1 mag., and two +2. All had very short trains (2-10 degrees) and seen within 30 degrees of zenith and radiant. Suspect a lot more fainter ones away from radiant were too stretched out and faint for us to see here. Clouds stopped our count at midnight, but satisfied the shower did occur on time and radiant position was good. Interesting group effort by EAAA members.

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