Don’t Miss the Geminids!

The years best meteor shower can be seen Tuesday evening, December 13th, right after sunset. The Geminid meteor shower will be hampered to some degree by a waning gibous moon, so best to catch it between sunset and moon rise.  This is the most prominent meteor shower of the year and has overtaken the Perseid meteor shower in terms of meteors per hour. Also, Kepler Space Telescope has possibly discovered a new planet that can sustain life. The satellite orbits the Earth and surveys 150,000 candidate stars for other planets. Closer examination by ground based instruments will give us more information. Scientists have also observed two new black holes in other galaxy’s. As it turns out these are the largest black holes ever discovered. And don’t miss what’s in the night sky this week. All this and more on this week’s Sky Talk.[audio: st20111212.mp3]