The Lyrid Meteor Shower
Excited about Spring? It’s also that time of the year when we get to see the sky lit with the Lyrid Meteor shower.
The Lyrid meteor shower is usually active from April 16 to 25 and this year the peak is expected to be on April 22. The best time to see the shower will be few hours before dawn. There could be 10-20 meteor shower per hour on April 22. And guess what? There will be no interference from the waxing moon!
Where to look?
The radiant point for Lyrid meteor shower is the Vega star in the constellation of Lyra. Lyra- The Harp, is directly overhead slightly to the north. Vega is the 5th brightest star in the sky so it won’t be that hard to figure it out. Vega is located 25 light years away from us. Not that far eh? Also, it was the first start to be Photographed! How cool is that?
The Lyra (Vega is the bright one on the top)
(Not my photo, Copyright belongs to the owner (I took it off Google)
How to see the shower?
The best way to see a meteor shower is to go away from the city with excessive light pollution to some rural areas. But if that’s not possible then, you can do it from your roof too! You’re not going to see a meteor shower if you just stare at the night sky, you have to adapt to the darkness in the night sky, i.e. you need to gaze at the sky for a long time, gradually everything will start to appear dark, that’s when you see every single thing that moves in the sky.
Or you can take your camera and mount it on a tripod and set the following settings and try to catch few in the photos:
I usually use
Shutter: 20”
F: 3.5
ISO: 3200
But it’s advised to use a lens with a wide aperture. In that case you might want to use ISO 1600. But it surely depends on the condition as well so just try few shots with different combination along that line. That’s the setting I used for the photo below. (P.S. I used a kit lens so the quality isn’t that good)
