Stargazers could be treated to a dazzling display at the end of May thanks to the remains of a shattered comet. The possible meteor shower, called the tau Heruclid, is forecast to peak on the night of Monday, May 30 and into the early morning of Tuesday, May 31, according to NASA.
But due to the circumstances, astronomers say it will be an "all or nothing event."Meteor showers happen as the Earth passes through the trail of dusty debris left by a comet.
They’re usually named after a star or constellation that’s closest to where the meteors appear in the sky. Some meteor showers happen regularly, occurring generally around the same time each year or at regular intervals due to the orbits of Earth and the comet.
The Perseids, for example, peak in August each year.FILE IMAGE - A photo montage taken on Aug. 13, 2021, shows the night sky during the Perseid Meteor Shower above an ecological demonstration zone of Engebei in Kubuqi Desert, north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. (Photo by Ren Junchuan/Xinhu The tau Herculid shower was described by NASA as a "possible newcomer" because of the circumstances surrounding the comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann, or "SW3."In 1930, German observers Arnold Schwassmann and Arno Arthur Wachmann discovered the SW3 comet, which orbited the sun every 5.4 years, according to the space agency.