The Northern Taurids Meteor Shower Explained

Few celestial phenomena are as sublime as a shooting star. More properly known as meteors, they are common enough that you can see one streak across the sky on practically any night of the year, as there's a lot of space-borne debris constantly falling to Earth. However, some times of the year are better than others if you want to see one, and in the fall, you might be able to catch sight of a meteor shower known as the Northern Taurids.

Meteor showers are caused by the Earth passing through the debris trail of a comet or asteroid, and because they follow fixed orbits, they occur at the same time each year. Whether a higher-than-normal occurrence of meteors qualifies as a shower is determined by the origin of the meteors, rather than a set threshold of meteors per hour. This localized origin causes the meteors of a meteor shower to appear to radiate out from the same point in the sky. This point is called the radiant, and the constellation it happens to be in is usually the source of the meteor shower's name, which in the case of the Northern Taurids is Taurus.

The Taurid meteor showers are a product of what is known as the Taurid meteor stream. The largest body in that stream is Encke's comet (officially known as 2P/Encke), which is responsible for much of the meteor activity associated with the Taurid meteor showers. The comet wasn't named after its discoverer, Pierre Méchain, but was named instead for the astronomer who calculated its orbit, Johann Franz Encke.

Encke's comet and the Taurid meteor stream are unique in that the debris trail that makes up most meteor showers is dusty, but the Taurid stream also comprises larger, stone-sized material. That means when one of these stones impacts the Earth's atmosphere, it doesn't produce the typical quick streak of light. Instead, it can produce a fireball bright enough to rival the light of the moon.

The flip side of these larger, brighter shooting stars is that the Taurid stream is also sparser than that of most meteor showers. In other words, the Taurid meteor shower won't produce as many meteors per hour as other showers. Still, the Taurid meteor stream is broader than most others, which means it takes a couple of weeks for the Earth to pass through it. So, even though the rate of meteors will be low, you'll have more opportunities to view them.

There are actually two streams associated with the Taurids, together referred to as the Taurid or Encke complex. It is thought the complex originated from the breakup of a large — over 60 miles in diameter — comet as it passed through our neighborhood, creating a massive debris stream of which Encke's comet is one of the largest bodies. It is also thought that the mysterious Tunguska Event was caused by a meteor in the Beta Taurid shower.

The Earth passes through the combined Taurid meteor stream two times over the course of a year. Between May and July, the daytime face of Earth passes through the stream, resulting in the Beta Taurids and the Zeta Perseids. Because these meteor showers occur during the day, they are impossible to view without specialized equipment. Between September and December, the nighttime face of Earth passes through the Taurid complex resulting in the Northern and Southern Taurids. The Southern Taurids peak a week to a month earlier in the year and are caused by Encke's comet, while the Northern Taurids occur after their southern counterpart and are caused by asteroid 2004 TG₁₀, a remnant of the original parent comet.

Technically, it's possible to see a Taurid meteor beginning in September with the onset of the Southern Taurids, but the best time to watch is in the first half of November. The Southern Taurids will peak first around November 5 this year and will appear to radiate out to the right of the lower half of the constellation Taurus (hence the appellation "Southern"). The Northern Taurids will peak a bit later on November 12 and will appear to radiate from just above the radiant of the Southern Taurids.

To fully appreciate the majesty of a meteor shower you'll want to be outside in a location with as little light pollution as possible, and the best time for viewing is around midnight when Taurus will be higher in the sky. The Taurids are visible from just about everywhere on Earth, but if you plan on viewing from the Northern Hemisphere, make sure you're wearing warm clothes and have a hot drink. You can always set out a blanket and lay on the ground to look at the stars, but if you want a chair, make sure it reclines and has good neck support. And don't worry about binoculars or a telescope, as you'll want to watch as much of the sky as possible.

The Taurids are unquestionably cool, but they aren't the only meteor shower you should look out for. There are four classes of meteor shower, with class I being the most prolific and class IV being the least, and the Taurids rank just above average at class II with a peak of five meteors per hour visible under ideal conditions. Compared to some other meteor showers, though, those are rookie numbers.

The most prolific meteor showers are the Geminids and the Quadrantids, which are active from November to January, and under perfect viewing conditions they can each produce up to 120 meteors per hour.  But even that pales in comparison to meteor storms, which can produce more than 1,000 meteors per hour. The last big meteor storm was produced by the Leonids in 2002, with rates up to 2,700 per hour, but the storm of 1966 put that to shame with rates of up to 40 per second. And then there was the 1833 Leonid meteor storm, which was so vast it led to major shifts in religious and scientific understanding. In other words, keep your eyes on the sky!