THE STAR SHOWER

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 661, 13 October 1933, Page 6

THE STAR SHOWER

NOT OBSERVED IN ANY PART OF NEW ZEALAND SOME EXPLANATIONS

Wellington, Thursday. The dazzling display of shooting 1 stars which "enthralled Europe," according to a cable item published this ! week was not seen by any of( Wellington's astronomers, and no report has as yet been received by the Dominion Observatory of any such shower being seen by anyone in this country. Possibly one reason why noth- [ ing was seen locally is the fact that ' the skies at night recently have been j very overcast, and although astron- ! omers have been on duty at one end | of their telescopes the other end ! has not played its part and their late hours of work have -brought them no reward. In the absence of further and more detailed information about this wonderful shower of shooting stars, it is not possible for astronomers in this part of the world to say much' that is enlightening. A shower of shooting ' stars from. the region of the constellation Orion, which is quite a famous shower, has been predicted to return on October 15, and another shower is expected to occur on October 18. Whether the shower seen in Europe is either or both of these showers arriving a week too soon remains to be decided by the abstruse calculations of astronomers.

Eanious Leonid Shower There is a further possibility that the shower seen is the famous Leonid shower, which was expected last year and which failed to keep the appointment that astronomers had made for it. Astronom.ical opinion has be.n divided ias t0 what hecame of ithis expected shower; some say that it has g one out of existence altogether — as ' a visible phenomenon— and will never | return, while others maintain that its orbit has been altered since it was last seen from the earth and that it has adopted a new timetable. A supporter of this later heory is Professor Pickeriiig, and he has predicted that the Leonid meteor showr will be seen in Europe in November this year and in America hext year. It may be that he is right in his prediction of the return of the Leonids, but wrong to the extent of a few weeks in his estimated timo. Whatever the origin of this shower seen in Europe, the fact remains that the current year in New Zealand, as well as elsewhere has been exceptionally fruitful in meteors. These have made more or less isolated appearances and have not been seen in showers; but their number and. brilliance has been such that 1933 will go down in astronomiieal records as a year of exceptional meteors, l