A true celestial spectacle has taken place every evening since April 16.
This phenomenon called the Lyrids, will be at its peak in intensity in the early morning hours this Friday.
To change your mind during a period of confinement, it will therefore be possible to observe several shooting stars per minute with the naked eye, if you have a balcony or a garden.
However, due to the strong luminosity of the Moon, the observation conditions will not be optimal.
To discover
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Read also: Shooting stars that light up from January to December
As Jamy Gourmaud, former host of
C'est pas Sorcier
,
recalls
, in his daily videos posted on social networks, during the period of confinement, these
"celestial objects have nothing to do with distant stars that sparkle in the firmament" .
Shooting stars are actually dusty debris left by comets.
Each year, the Earth passes through these dusty areas as it moves around the sun.
"When the earth crosses one of these regions, the dust enters the atmosphere, it undergoes significant friction and ends up burning, generating what we call a shower of shooting stars"
, thus tells Jamy in a short educational video.
A less polluted and clearer sky
The shooting stars observable this very early Friday morning come from comet C / 1861 G1, better known as Thatcher, which crosses the path of the Earth every year.
The celestial body owes its nickname to the American astronomer Albert E. Thatcher, who discovered the comet in 1861, and not to the former British prime minister.
In the year of her discovery, Thatcher passed 50.1 million kilometers from Earth, which is relatively close.
"Each rain of shooting stars bears the name of a constellation from which they seem to come",
adds astronomer Sébastien Fontaine, on Franceinfo. The Lyrids thus seem to come from the constellation Lyra, whose brightest star is Vega. Perfectly visible to the naked eye, it is also thanks to Véga that the curious will be able to identify the constellation of Lyra on Wednesday evening.
To have the best chance of seeing shooting stars, astronomer Sébastien Fontaine, and director of the Planétarieum at the Palais de la Découverte, recommends observing the sky around 5 a.m.
“The ideal is to be lying on the ground, looking towards the South-East.
You look at the sky and wait for the shooting stars to arrive, ”
recommends the astronomer.
It will also be possible to see Jupiter, Saturn or even Mars, if the weather permits.
But visibility should be reduced due to strong moonlight, NASA said in a statement.
