Though many meteor showers are remnants of comets, the Geminids are the product of a small asteroid called 3200 Phaethon. It is suspected that the asteroid was involved in a collision that produced a rocky, dusty trail that burns up in Earth’s atmosphere as the orbits intersect every year. The source of the meteors is actually puzzling to astronomers, because the large amount of debris in the shower is rather inordinate for the small size of the parent body.
The best time to head outside and view the meteor shower will be a few hours before midnight local time, but if you aren’t able to head outside then or don’t live in an area where the shower will be visible, be sure to tune into the event covered by the Slooh Community Observatory on Saturday, December 13. The webcast will be hosted by Slooh Astronomer Bob Berman, Will Gater, and Eric Edelman, who will explain all of the bizarre attributes of this annual shower.
“The Geminids are very strange because they hit Earth sideways. It is the difference between being in a car and slamming head on into somebody as opposed to someone backing into you sideways, perhaps coming out of a driveway and crunching into you gently. These meteors hit us gently. While Summer’s Perseids strike Earth at 37 miles per second, that’s amazingly fast, and the Leonids are even a little bit faster, hitting us at just over 40 miles a second, these Geminids hit us at only 22 miles a second,” Berman said in a press release.
http://www.iflscience.com/space/check-out-sights-and-sounds-geminid-meteor-shower
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