Summer Meteor Showers: Peak Dates For Watching In Tampa Bay

SARASOTA, FL — Two meteor showers are expected to put on quite a light show in the skies above Tampa Bay before the summer comes to a close. The Delta Aquarids began making cameo appearances in the night sky last week while the much-anticipated Perseids are expected to get under way starting Monday night.

The Perseids' annual run begins July 17 as the earth passes into the path of the Comet Swift-Tuttle. Tampa Bay area residents concerned about mostly cloudy skies over the next few nights can breathe a sigh of relief though. The Perseids aren’t expected to hit their peak until Aug. 12, which ups the likelihood of at least a few clear nights between now and then.

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While the Perseids are starting, there’s a good chance any meteors residents spot before the Aug. 12 peak are part of the Delta Aquarids. The aquarids began showing up in the night skies last week and are expected to continue through Aug. 13. The peak dates for the Delta Aquarids are July 29-30.

The Delta Aquarids are sort of an opening act for the Perseids. The latter show is so reliable and impressive that stargazers often plan their schedules to be available to watch them during peak dates.

NASA meteor expert Bill Cooke advises the Perseids peak is quite spectacular to behold. During the peak, Perseids meteors are visible at a rate of about 150 per hour. The means stargazers should be able to see about two to three meteors a minute – some faint trails of light, others appearing more like fireballs in the sky. Cooke suggests stargazers allow about 30 minutes for their eyes to adjust to the dark and then settle in for a few hours to take in the show.

The Delta Aquarids produces about 20 meteors an hour at its peak and is regarded as an average meteor shower. A crescent moon will have set by the time they tune up, leaving skies dark for the late-night and early-morning Delta Aquarids meteor shower, according to seasky.org.

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The Perseids’ Aug. 12 peak comes when Earth passes through the densest, dustiest area of the wide path of Comet Swift-Tuttle — about 16 miles wide at its nucleus, according to space.com. The last time it passed near Earth was during its orbit of the sun in 1992, something that won’t happen again until 2126. The comet itself is a rare occurrence, but the annual meteor shower is a brilliant reminder of it.

Meteors are pieces of comet debris that heat up as they enter the atmosphere then burn in a bright burst of light that streaks across the sky at up to 37 miles per second, according to space.com. Most of the Perseids meteors are so small — they’re about the size of a grain of sand — that they’ll never become “meteorites” that fall to the Earth.

In the Tampa Bay area, mostly cloudy skies are expected over the next week or so in the evening hours, according to the National Weather Service. Whether a break in cloud cover during the evening hours will occur in time for Delta’s July 29-30 peak or the peak of the Perseids on Aug. 12 remains to be seen.

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