How to See the First Big Meteor Show of the Year

A bright light is set to illuminate the sky, heralding the first celestial event of the year.

The Quadrantid meteor shower is expected to peak on Friday, January 3, in the pre-dawn hours, with a spectacular display overnight of 30 to 60 meteors per hour. This year’s Quadrantids will not be disturbed by the Moon’s light, ensuring a perfect viewing of the most famous meteor shower to grace our skies.

To fully enjoy the Quadrantids this year, the meteor shower is best viewed from the Northern Hemisphere, although it is still visible throughout the sky, according to EarthSky. Meteor showers should be enjoyed in poorly lit areas, preferably away from city lights. You should prepare for a long night because it starts climbing around 2 am until dawn.

Last year, astronomers were distracted by the Moon, which was 51% full on the night the Quadrantids took place. However, this year, the meteor shower will coincide with a waxing crescent moon, which will not interfere with the display of the lights.

The Quadrantids is an annual shower which appeared for the first time in 1825. It is active from the end of December to the middle of January. The meteor shower has a narrow window that lasts only a few hours each year because of the particles and the angle at which the Earth passes through the stream, according to NASA.

However, the meteor shower creates quite a show within those few hours. The quadrantids are known for their bright fiery meteors, which emit large bursts of light and color that come from particles of material.

While most meteor showers come from comets, the Quadrantids come from asteroids. The space rock, known as Asteroid 2003 EH1, orbits the Sun once every five and a half years. It is a small asteroid, about two miles (3 kilometers) across, and it can be a dead comet or a rock comet (an asteroid with an orbit that resembles a comet).

The Bright Quadrantids, or places in the sky where the meteor shower appears to be coming from, are an ancient constellation called the Quadrans Muralis, according to NASA. French astronomer Jerome Lalande created the constellation in 1795, but it was removed from the list of recognized constellations in 1922 by the International Astronomical Union.

The first meteor of the year introduces a number of celestial events that astronomy enthusiasts will enjoy, including the four planets Venus, Mars, Saturn and Jupiter that are visible a few hours after sunset throughout the month of January.