The meteorite showers break when the dust of a kite or asteroid that passes through the atmosphere of the earth. The small parts, approximately the size of a grain of sand, vaporize creating visible light stripes.
As the earth passes through the densest part of the powder current, they are visible more meteors. For Lyrids, it is likely to be a maximum of around 18 meteors per hour.
In some years, however, this can be intense and there may be 100 meteors every hour, but it is very different to know when this volume occurs.
Lyrid’s observations date back to about 2,700 years, which means that it is one of the oldest known meteorite showers.
Fire balls are created by Compt Thatcher’s debris, which takes more than 400 years to orbit the sun and was discovered in 1861 by AE Thatcher.
They bear the name of the Lyra constellation and the radiant position, which is where the meteors seem to emanate, is southwest of Star Vega.
