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Dubai sky to glow with hundreds of meteors this weekend

Dubai - The shower produces 50 or more meteors every hour.

This could well be the month of celestial spectacles in the UAE. After the partial lunar eclipse, it's now time to witness the Perseid meteor shower.

No matter where you live worldwide, the 2017 Perseid meteor shower will probably produce the greatest number of meteors on the mornings of August 11, 12 and 13. In a dark, moonless sky, this shower often produces 50 or more meteors per hour. A good number of Perseid meteors will be bright, so you should be able to see Perseids, despite the moonlit glare.

Dubai Astronomy Group will be hosting a public event, August 11-13, as one of the most reliable meteor showers of the year, the Perseid meteor shower, goes underway when Earth moves into the debris field of the comet Swift-Tuttle. While the meteor shower will peak on August 11-13, the programme is scheduled for the weekend so most people can make it for the event. Labeled as the 'Summer Celestial Spectacle', one can expect to see around 100 to 150 meteors per hour on the peak night in a dark sky.

Every year, from around July 17 to August 24, Earth crosses the orbital path of comet Swift-Tuttle, the parent of the Perseid meteor shower. Debris from this comet litters the comet's orbit, but we don't really get into the thick of the comet rubble until after the first week of August. The bits and pieces from comet Swift-Tuttle slam into the Earth's upper atmosphere at some 210,000 kilometers (130,000 miles) per hour, lighting up the nighttime with fast-moving Perseid meteors. If our planet happens to pass through an unusually dense clump of meteoroids - comet rubble - we'll see an elevated number of meteors.

The event will also provide visitors an opportunity to look through Dubai Astronomy Group telescopes at other celestial objects including; Saturn, stars, globular clusters, nebula and other deep sky objects. The event will also feature live presentations, planetarium shows and videos about the night sky.