Kirsty Mckenzie
Star-gazers rejoice!
Soon you will be able to witness a stunning spectacles of shooting stars in Spain this month.
The Lyrids meteor shower is an annual event that takes place every April as the Earth passes through the leftover dust in the solar system from Comet C/186 G1 Thatcher, which was discovered in 1861.
It is expected to peak next Wendesday (April 21) and will remain visible in the sky until the early morning on Thursday.
The night-sky spectacle is considered to be one of the most impressive of the year, with as many as 18 meteors blazing through the sky per hour.
Experts say that an absent moon will ensure that the meteors stand out brightly during the evening.
Rarely, the Lyrids produce surges of up to 100 meteors per hour, so it is definitely worth staying up for.
These meteors, nicknamed Lyrid fireballs, travel through the atmosphere at approximately 107,000mph and explode about 55 miles above the Earth’s atmosphere.
Friction with the upper atmosphere heats up the incoming debris, causing the air around them to glow brightly.
This leads to streaks of light that are also known as shooting stars.
To see the shower, observers should look upwards after 11pm time on Wednesday 21, when the radiant will be high.
Remember the best views are always away from city lights, but with good weather and a clear sky even urban skywatchers should see at least a few spectacular shooting stars.
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