08/13/2026
If you missed last night's show, try again tonight. They startdd slow around 9pm, but by 10 it got busy. Lots of satellites were going by too. No noise, moving fast.
🚨 TONIGHT IS THE NIGHT : THE PERSEIDS PEAK UNDER A MOONLESS SKY! ☄️
⏰SAVE THIS POST NOW- then set your alarm.
If you've been waiting for one night this summer to go outside and watch shooting stars, make it tonight.
The Perseid meteor shower peaks tonight, August 12, into dawn August 13: and this year the timing could hardly be better.
🌑 NEW MOON = NO MOONLIGHT= DARK SKY.
That means even the fainter Perseids won't have to compete with a bright Moon. NASA calls the conditions ideally dark for tonight's peak.
🎯 TONIGHT'S SKY MISSION: PERSEID PEAK
⏰ WHEN: 10 pm – 4 a.m. local time
⭐ MY PICK:midnight to 2 a.m., when Perseus is higher and meteor activity should be much easier to catch.
Can't stay up that late? Go outside in the late evening anyway. You may catch one of my favourites, a long Earth-grazing Perseidskimming dramatically across the sky.
# # # YOUR MISSION
1️⃣ Find the darkest sky you can.
Even getting away from streetlights will help.
2️⃣ Forget the telescope/binoculars
This is a naked-eye event. Lie back and take in as much sky as possible.
3️⃣ Don't stare at Perseus.
The meteors appear to radiate from that constellation, but they can streak across any part of the sky. Face the darkest, most open part of your sky.
4️⃣ Give your eyes 30 minutes to adjust.
Put the phone away. Every glance at a bright screen resets your night vision.
5️⃣ COUNT THEM!
Watch for at least 20–30 minutes and keep a running meteor tally.
😲Every Perseid you see tonight is a tiny piece of Comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle slamming into Earth's atmosphere at about 59 km per second...more than 210,000 km/h !!
And the comet that left all this debris behind?
🦖Its nucleus is roughly 26 kilometres wide, and it takes about 133 years to orbit the Sun. NASA notes that it's almost twice the size of the asteroid believed to have caused the dinosaur extinction.🦕
Most of those glowing streaks, though, are produced by tiny pieces of comet debris burning up harmlessly high above us.
And keep watching for the big ones: the Perseids are famous for bright fireballs and lingering glowing trails. Under ideal conditions the shower has historically produced rates approaching 50–100 meteors per hour, although what you'll actually see depends heavily on darkness, weather and your observing location.
🌌SKY MISSION CHALLENGE:
Go outside tonight, watch for at least 30 minutes, and then come back here tomorrow and tell me:
📍 Where did you watch from?
☄️ How many meteors did you count?
🔥 Did you catch a fireball
👇 Drop your observing location in the comments NOW so we can see where tonight's Perseid watchers are gathering.
🔖 SAVE THIS so you have the instructions tonight.
📤 And SHARE IT with that friend who always says, “Why didn't you tell me about this?!"
Tonight, we're all looking up together.
- Andrew, The Night Sky Guy
