Meteors and Milky Way over Mount Rainier
Image Credit & Copyright:
Matthew Dieterich
Despite appearances, the sky is not falling.
Two weeks ago, however, tiny bits of comet dust were.
Featured here is the
Perseids meteor shower as captured over
Mt. Rainier,
Washington,
USA.
The image was created from a two-hour time lapse video, snaring over 20 meteors, including one that
brightened dramatically on the image left.
Although each
meteor train typically lasts less than a second,
the camera was able to capture their
color progressions as they disintegrated in the
Earth's atmosphere.
Here an initial green
tint may be indicative of
small amounts of glowing magnesium atoms that were knocked off the
meteor by atoms in the
Earth's atmosphere.
To cap things off, the central band of our
Milky Way Galaxy
was simultaneously photographed rising straight up behind the snow-covered peak of
Mt. Rainier.
Another
good meteor shower
is expected in mid-November when debris from a different comet intersects Earth as the
Leonids.