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How To Watch Geminids In SoCal, The Year's Best Meteor Shower
A meteor streaks across the sky during the peak of the Geminids meteor shower at Pedernales Falls State Park on Dec. 13, 2020, in Johnson City, Texas.
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Rick Kern
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Getty Images
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It’s the most wonderful time of the year as the Geminids meteor shower reaches its peak overnight (Thursday, Dec. 14) at around 2 a.m.
[And if you don’t want to stay up until early morning, you might be able to catch some of the show as early as 9 p.m.]
Arguably the best annual meteor shower, it reliably produces some of the brightest fireballs. Clear skies and no moon mean viewing conditions are going to be just about perfect, assuming you find a spot dark enough.
What you should know
The Geminids are bits and pieces of asteroid 3200 Phaethon that enter Earth’s atmosphere at around 79,000 mph and burn up at about 50 miles above the surface. Their green hue may be due to the presence of nickel.
To see them in Southern California, you’re going to want to find a spot that’s classified as Bortle 7 (a scale indicating the amount of light pollution) or lower, according to this map. The best places (which I've written about before) are going to be high up in the San Gabriels or deep in the desert, though surprisingly, the Santa Monica Mountains offer a few decently dark locations.
The Bortle scale helps give some context to how bright the sky is and whether you'll be able to see an astronomical event.
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International Dark Sky Association
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In the suburbs you may see one Geminid every 5 to 10 minutes, while in an extremely dark spot (Bortle 2) you could see as many as one per minute.
Dos and don'ts
“Do not look at your cell phone. It ruins night vision,” said Bill Cooke, the lead for NASA’s meteoroid environment office.
He recommends laying on your back, staring straight up at the sky and giving your eyes about 30 minutes to adjust to the darkness.
“I can’t tell you the number of messages I get from people who are saying, ‘Yeah, me and my bud were out observing so and so meteor shower and we didn’t see anything! I was texting him all night and he didn’t see anything either,'" Cooke said. "That’s because they’re looking at their stupid cell phones!”
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What's next
You'll be able to see Geminids until Dec. 24.
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