2000-Year-Old Meteors to Rain Down on August 31, 2007

The meteors that are about to rain down in the early morning of September 1 date from around 4 A.D., the latest calculations show. It is not often that we can tell when a shooting star was first released from a comet into space, to travel as a meteoroid in an orbit around the Sun, and finally collide with Earth's atmosphere to shine as a meteor for our enjoyment. Most meteors that sporadically flash across the sky on a dark moonless night date from anonymous times. Only in recent years have we learned to trace young meteor showers, just a few revolutions old, to their date of origin.

The oldest such shower, but only one revolution old, is due in the early morning of September 1, 2007...

If you spot one of those meteors, you may be only the fourth person alive who is known to have seen this meteor shower...

If you are lucky enough to catch a picture of an Aurigid meteor using your digital camera, you will be the very first to do so...