"Beyond the Rim" by Brad Goldpaint, goldpaintphotography.com

Just when I thought Crater Lake couldn’t get any more photogenic, Brad Goldpaint captures a Lyrid meteor over it.

Did you see it? One of the more common questions during a meteor shower occurs because the time it takes for a meteor to flash is typically less than the time it takes for a head to turn. Possibly, though, the glory of seeing bright meteors shoot across and knowing that they were once small pebbles on another world might make it all worthwhile, even if your observing partner(s) could not share in every particular experience. Peaking over the past few days, a dark moonless sky allowed the Lyrids meteor shower to exhibit as many as 30 visible meteors per hour from some locations. A bright Lyrid meteor streaks above picturesque Crater Lake in Oregon, USA, in the above composite of nine exposures taken last week. Snow covers the foreground, while the majestic central band of our home galaxy arches well behind the serene lake. Other meteor showers this year include the Perseids in mid-August and the Leonids in mid-November, both expected to also dodge the glare of a bright Moon in 2012.

Perseid over Poi Pu, Kauai, taken Aug. 7, 2010. Photo by Jeff Berkes.

I went out last night around 11:30, got a crick in my neck and saw three Perseids (two small, one streaky and bright.) I also got a good eye-helping of the Milky Way. This photo is better than my experience in a way, as it combines the two — but really, the experience is much better than looking at a photo. (Even if you only see three Perseids. I’m sure they all came out just as soon as I walked back inside!)

Credit & Copyright: Jimmy Westlake (Colorado Mountain College)

The Perseid meteor shower is my favorite astronomical event of the year, and one I look forward to all summer. I have fond childhood memories of staring at the skies with my parents, out on the back lawn. On this funky old chocolate/ivory zebra-striped blanket. The things you remember. [shrug]

Anyway, the image above is doubly neat, in that it is a Perseid seen against auroral glow in Colorado, taken in August 2000. Since anybody north of me (pretty much) has just seen a whopper of a geomagnetic storm, it seemed appropriate. And speaking of last night’s storm, I conclude with this beautiful shot from Denmark:

Photo credit: Jesper Grønne, Denmark

The Meteor of 1860 by Frederic Church. Courtesy: Judith Filenbaum Hernstadt (painting photographed by Gerald L. Carr)

Yesterday’s APOD featured a painting and poem that documented a fireball event in 1860. The Meteor of 1860 by Frederic Church is a beautiful work of art, and dovetails nicely with this snippet of Walt Whitman’s Year of Meteors:

…the strange huge meteor procession, dazzling and clear, shooting over our heads,
(A moment, a moment long, it sail’d its balls of unearthly light over our heads,
Then departed, dropt in the night, and was gone;)

Here’s the story of how these two works were connected to the cosmic phenomenon, and eachother:

Frederic Church (1826-1900), American landscape painter of the Hudson River School, painted what he saw in nature. And on July 20th, 1860, he saw a spectacular string of fireball meteors cross the Catskill evening sky, an extremely rare Earth-grazing meteor procession. From New York City, poet Walt Whitman (1819-1892) also wrote of the “… strange huge meteor procession, dazzling and clear, shooting over our heads” in his poem Year of Meteors (1859-60). But the inspiration for Whitman’s words was forgotten. His astronomical reference became a mystery, the subject of scholarly debate until Texas State University physicists Donald Olson and Russell Doescher, English professor Marilynn Olson, and Honors Program student Ava Pope, located reports documenting the date and timing of the spectacular meteor procession. The breakthrough was spotting the connection with Church’s relatively little-known painting. Fittingly, the forensic astronomy team’s work was just published, on the 150th anniversary of the cosmic event that inspired both poet and painter.

Kvaløya, near Tromsø, Norway. Photo by Bjørnar G. Hansen.

A selection of Geminids for your Friday viewing pleasure. (Especially for any poor saps out there beside myself who had overcast skies last weekend.)

Photo by Phil Hart, http://philhart.com/blogs/phil

Photo by Wally Pacholka (AstroPics.com, TWAN)

Abyaneh, Isfahan, Iran. Photo by Amir H. Abolfath.

Meteor over Oak Heights, Ontario, Canada. Photo by Andreas Gada

SpaceWeather.com has just informed me that the above image is NOT a Leonid meteor… but it’s pretty anyway. The full 2009 Leonid gallery has more lovely images from the past few days. Also, check out the November Aurora gallery for scenes like the one below:

Aurora over Tromsø, Norway - Nov. 10, 2009. Photo by Tom Roland.

A striking pendant in sterling silver. And suddenly it reminds me very much of a cookie press insert. But spacey.

Fireball Meteor Over Groningen - Credit & Copyright: Robert Mikaelyan

Too fantastic not to (wait until it’s not today’s APOD and then) share, today’s APOD by Robert Mikaelyan is simply astounding. Would love to see one of these first-hand!

The brilliant fireball meteor captured in this snapshot was a startling visitor to Tuesday evening’s twilight skies over the city of Groningen. In fact, sightings of the meteor, as bright as the Full Moon, were widely reported throughout the Netherlands and Germany at approximately 17:00 UT. Accompanied by sonic booms and rumbling sounds, the meteor was seen to break up into bright fragments, eventually leaving a persistent smoke-like trail. Even though there are bright fireball meteors in planet Earth’s atmosphere every day, sightings of them are relatively rare because they more often occur over oceans and uninhabited areas.

Photo by Pete Lawrence, Selsey, West Sussex, UK - Aug. 12, 2009

SpaceWeather.com has a gallery of Perseid meteors from this week’s shower, fantastic photos all! Here are a few of my favorites.

Photo by Yuichi Takasaka, Bow Valley, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada - Aug. 12, 2009

Photo by Ugur Ikizler, Mudanya - Bursa / Turkey - Aug. 13, 2009

Photo by Mahdi Zamani, Abianeh, Kashan, Edfahan, Iran - Aug. 13, 2009

And Google, with another of their beautifully-done “holiday” logos, displayed this on August 12:

Another interesting poster at SpaceNews.jp, for an event sponsored by JAXA, and related somehow to Yuri’s Night. A sweet illustration of a Japanese schoolboy watching a shooting star.