How to watch the Perseid meteor shower

Pop some kernels and head outside for the meteor show Wednesday night!

Skywatchers can catch the Perseid meteor shower in one of its brightest displays in years thanks to a coinciding new moon.

"The Perseids feature fast and bright meteors that frequently leave trains, and in 2015 there will be no moonlight to upstage the shower," NASA said.

A dark space is all you need to see the show at its peak in the late-night Wednesday into pre-dawn hours of Thursday. It falls in the Perseus constellation in the northeastern part of the sky.

If you want to learn more about meteors and the Perseid shower, NASA TV and NASA’s UStream channel will host a live show with meteor science experts from Wednesday night into Thursday morning. Their commentary will answer questions from anyone curious about the meteors.

Perseid meteors are bits of dust and ice from the Swift-Tuttle comet, according to NASA. Earth and the comet cross paths each August, and the particles burn up in an atmospheric light show. It last coincided with a new moon in 2007.

The meteors can fall at theoretical speeds of around 37 miles per second and at a rate of about 80 per hour, according to NASA.

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