The Perseid meteor shower peaks tonight. Here's how to watch it in B.C.

The annual Perseid meteor shower is seen in the night sky on August 14, 2023, in Ratnapura, Sri Lanka. (NurPhoto via Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

British Columbians might want to stay up late on Sunday, as the annual celestial light show known as the Perseid meteor shower will be dazzling in the sky.

The shower is forecast to peak on Aug. 12, and the best time to view it is after midnight and into the early hours of the morning, when the sky is darkest. During the peak, as many as 100 meteorites can be seen shooting across the sky every hour, according to NASA.

The Perseid shower happens every summer when the earth passes through the debris of the Swift-Tuttle comet’s tail, explained Matthew Cimone, head interpreter at the H.R. MacMillan Space Centre in Vancouver.

“The meteor shower we’re going to see is basically all the debris from that comet burning up in our atmosphere,” he told CTV News Sunday. “Some of them are actually not much bigger than a grain of sand, but they are heated to such extreme temperatures that we’ll see them streak across the sky and burn up.”

The meteor shower gets its name from the Perseus constellation, which is where tonight’s “shooting stars” will appear to radiate from.

“The best way to think of it is if you’re ever driving through snow and the snow looks like it’s radiating from the centre of your windshield. It’s the same kind of idea,” Cimone explained. “(Perseus) is the centre of our windshield right now in the sky as the earth is plowing through that material.”

The ideal place to see the meteor shower is anywhere with a clear, dark sky away from the light pollution of the city. Anywhere that’s cloudy, or where there’s haze from wildfire smoke, will obscure the view, Cimone said.

“Anywhere outside of the city where you can find a comfortable spot, somewhere you can pull over safely on the side of the road, or if you have a camping spot,” he said. “Bring a chair, somewhere to sit, make it comfortable, and then look up and see the cosmological event happening before your eyes.”

The best part is, no equipment such as telescopes or binoculars are required to take in the show. In fact the opposite is true, he added, you’ll want as wide of a field of view of the sky as possible. Cimone’s advice is to keep your head on a swivel and scan the whole sky, but particularly focus on Perseus in the northeast.

“These are ancient pieces of debris that are left over from the original formation of the solar system; some of them are billions of years old and so in some sense you’re watching the end point, the period on the life of some ancient little piece of debris floating through space from literally the beginning of our solar system—and you get to see that happen,” he said.

“It’s a reminder that our solar system is ancient, but still active, and we get to be part of that. That’s what life is; it’s pretty amazing.”