Easily one of the best meteor showers of 2013 is set to light up the sky tonight or early tomorrow, according to Space.com.
The Geminid shower occurs once a year when Earth passes through a trail of debris left behind the asteroid 3200 Phaethon, according to Space.com. The shower was originally discovered in the 1800s when approximately 20 meteors could be seen per hour.
"Those rates have increased over the almost two centuries since then by up to over 120 an hour," Cooke said. "This is because Jupiter's gravity is tugging that string of debris that comprises the Geminids closer to Earth as time goes along. Geminid rates over the next decade or century could exceed over 200 per hour."
The shower, named after the constellation Gemini, will provide onlookers the chance to see approximately 90 to 120 meteors per hour, according to Bill Cooke, head of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office.
Slooh's live broadcast of the meteor shower started around 5:30 p.m. Weather permitting, the show could officially start around 4 a.m. local time.
For those who want to watch the shower outside, Geminid meteors usually radiate from the constellation Gemini. The meteors have a reputation for being "bright and slow" so if you have trouble finding the constellation, Cooke said the best thing to do is just look up.
"The best thing to do to observe meteors is to lie flat on your back and look straight up," Cooke said. "You don't want to look at Gemini, you just want to look straight up and take in as much of the sky as possible because meteors can appear anywhere in the sky and the more sky you see, the better you chance of seeing a meteor."
Meteor showers are created when Earth passes through streams of debris left by comets or asteroids, according to Space.com.
The Slooh broadcast can be found at the bottom of this article.
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