What is a Meteor Shower?

A meteor shower occurs when lots of meteoroids enter the Earth’s atmosphere. Meteoroids are bits of dust and rock from comets that are released when their orbit brings them close to the Sun. The Sun’s heat boils off some of the comet’s icy surface and the resulting debris then trails it in orbit. Meteoroids that enter the Earth’s atmosphere are known as meteors, and can regularly be seen travelling across the night sky. However, several times each year, the Earth’s orbit crosses with the orbit of a comet causing it to collide with a bunch of meteoroids all at once. As they are usually very small, most meteors burn up in the atmosphere before they reach the Earth’s surface, but those that do occasionally hit the ground are known as meteorites.

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