By Toutatis! A shower of shooting stars is about to sweep across the summer sky, promising to turn our nights into a true cosmic show. This is not a mirage or a Nolan trailer: from mid-July until mid-August, the Perseids are lighting up the sky, with a peak intensity expected on the night of August 12th to 13th. We’re talking about 100 shooting stars per hour. Yes, 100. That’s enough to blow your wish quota for the next ten years!
Behind this breathtaking spectacle, lies comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle, the official fireworks maker of our galaxy. Every summer, Earth crosses its cosmic path, and its dust burns up in the atmosphere, creating those bright trails we love to watch while lying on the grass, necks craned and eyes wide open.
The darker, the better!
But be careful, to enjoy the show, you’ll need to be a little clever. Forget city balconies or rooftops!
with stars éclairés : light pollution is the number one enemy of the Perseids. Instead, opt for a nighttime excursion away from the city, towards the peaks or deep in the countryside. The darker, the better.
For the purists out there, the perfect time window is between midnight and 4 AM, when the Milky Way puts on its most stunning strobe effect. Grab a blanket, create a great playlist (and why not a thermos of hot chocolate), and it's time for a magical night of stargazing as the sky tells you stories of stars.