Every year in August the night sky becomes the stage for an impressive natural phenomenon: the Perseids, a prolific meteor shower.
They form when the Earth crosses the orbit of the Swift-Tuttle comet. Tiny dust and rock particles enter the atmosphere and burn up – visible as luminous shooting stars or meteors. The first observation from the German part of the meteor camera network in StAnD reached us from the Egbert-Gymnasium.
Münsterschwarzach in cooperation with the monastery observatory of the Abbey of Münsterschwarzach captured this image on the night of August 10th to 11th:
The meteor can be seen in the centre right, and in the clouds at the bottom left is the almost-full moon, whose brightness makes observing the Perseids more difficult this year.
Meteor events are automatically recorded and saved by the StAnD meteor detection cameras. They are then available for analysis by school classes after the summer holidays. Further information on meteors for classroom use is available in the StAnD Teacher’s Manual .
Keep an eye out also for details on how to obtain this camera data: we will soon be releasing guidelines for any school wishing to use the data from these cameras in their classrooms!