Overview
- Perseid meteors are dust grains shed by comet Swift-Tuttle that ignite in Earth’s atmosphere at high speeds.
- Glare from the Aug. 9 full moon is currently limiting sightings to roughly 15–20 meteors per hour.
- Axial precession has shifted the shower’s traditional Aug. 10 maximum to the night of Aug. 12–13.
- Under ideal dark-sky conditions, observers could count up to 70–80 meteors per hour at dawn on Aug. 13.
- Meteor activity will taper off rapidly after Aug. 13 as Earth exits the densest portion of Swift-Tuttle’s debris stream.