Thousands of shooting stars provided a dazzling light show Sunday that amazed veteran and novice stargazers alike as the Leonid meteor shower made the moonless sky appear to rain light. At the peak of the early morning shower, as many as 1,250 meteors per hour streaked overhead.  About 150 Chinese who gathered at midnight on the roof of a 550-year-old Ming Dynasty stone observatory in Beijing were overjoyed when the first meteor tore across the sky leaving an ephemeral fiery trail in its wake.
``There are many more shooting stars than I expected, and they're really clear,'' said a 19-year-old construction engineering student. Atop Mount Wilson (U.S.), hundreds of cars clogged the road leading to the observatory as stargazers sought out dark spots to watch the display. Patty Ronney, 49, said she had never seen a single meteor before leaving home. Streak after streak of light shot across the sky as tiny bits of comet debris burned up harmlessly in the atmosphere. The brightest flares left shimmering, smoky trails that hung in the sky for a few seconds. Clear skies also rewarded more than 1,000 stargazers who sat on lawn chairs at a youth training camp near Seoul, South Korea. The Leonid shower occurs each November, when the Earth's orbit takes it through the trail of particles shed by the Comet Tempel-Tuttle as it swings around the sun once every 33 years. Most particles are smaller than a grain of rice. They enter our atmosphere traveling 45 miles a second and burn up in brilliant streaks of light. The meteors are called Leonids because they appear to come from the direction of the constellation Leo. The last major Leonid shower occurred in 1966, when stargazers counted as many as 150,000 meteors per hour. Astronomers expect another such shower in 2099. Comets are believed to contain pristine examples of the materials that coalesced 4.5 billion years ago to form our solar system. The frozen balls of ice and debris are rich with basic elements like iron, as well as carbon-based molecules. (Agencies) | 11月19日凌晨獅子座流星雨如期而至，成千上萬顆流星將晴朗的夜空照耀的無比燦爛，讓新老天文愛好者嘆為觀止。 在這場流星雨的高峰階段，空中劃過的流星達到每小時1250顆之多。 在中國，約有150名天文愛好者聚集在北京一個有550年歷史的明代天文臺的屋頂上等待一睹流星雨的風采。當第一顆流星拖著火紅的尾巴劃破夜空時，人們不禁欣喜若狂。 一名19歲的建筑工程系的學生說："天空中出現的流星比我預想的要多，而且肉眼看得非常清楚。" 在美國，通往威爾遜山頂上天文臺的山路被 "追星族"的車子堵塞了。人們紛紛尋找昏暗的觀測地點以便更好的欣賞流星雨。 49歲的帕蒂-龍尼說她在離開家趕到威爾遜山之前，從來沒有見到過流星。 無數的彗星碎片在大氣中燃燒，于是人們看到了一顆顆流星從空中劃過的壯觀景象，這些體積不大的彗星碎片的燃燒不會給人類帶來災難。那些最亮的流星拖著閃耀的氣狀慧尾劃過空中，持續時間長達數秒鐘。 在晴朗的夜空下，韓國漢城一個青年訓練營中1000多名天文觀測者也坐在草坪上的長椅上，盡情欣賞了這一難得的天文景觀。 獅子座流星雨在每年的11月份出現一次。當地球穿過"坦佩爾-塔特爾"彗星尾部稠密的彗星碎片帶時，就會出現流星雨現象。這顆彗星在太陽系外圍軌道運行，它的運行周期是33年。 大部分彗星碎片大小還不及一粒大米。這些碎片以每秒鐘45英里的速度穿過地球大氣層，與大氣層摩擦燃燒，在天空中留下一道道耀眼的光亮。這些流星之所以被命名為"獅子座流星"，是因為它們是從獅子星座的方向飛來的。 最近一次規模較大的獅子座流星雨發生在1966 年，在那次的流星雨中，據觀測者統計流量達到了每小時15萬顆。天文學家預測下一次類似規模的獅子座流星雨將要等到2099年。 彗星中含有45億年前的原始合成物質，太陽系就是由這些物質構成的。慧尾冰球狀的碎片中含有大量類似鐵和碳分子的物質。 (中國日報網站譯) |
Updated: 2001-11-20 01:00
