The Sky Tonight Update: Full Beaver Moon

The Moon will be located on the opposite side of the Earth as the Sun and its face will be will be fully illuminated. This phase occurs at 09:17 UTC. This full moon was known by early Native American tribes as the Beaver Moon because this was the time of year to set the beaver traps before the swamps and rivers froze.

The Sky Tonight Update: Leonids Meteor Shower

The Leonids is an average shower, producing up to 15 meteors per hour at its peak. This shower is unique in that it has a cyclonic peak about every 33 years where hundreds of meteors per hour can be seen. That last of these occurred in 2001.

Periodic Comet Tempel-Tuttle, officially known as 55P/Temple-Tuttle, is responsible for the Leonid meteor shower. William Tempel of Marseilles Observatory in France discovered this comet on the evening of December 19, 1865. He found the comet in the northern sky, located in a part of the sky under the north star, near the star Beta Ursae Minoris.

The Sky Tonight Update: Taurids Meteor Shower

The Taurids is a long-running minor meteor shower producing only about 5-10 meteors per hour. It is unusual in that it consists of two separate streams.

The object responsible for the Northern Taurid meteor shower is believed to be an asteroid. And that asteroid is related to a comet.