What a meteor looks like from space

Speaking of awesome space photos, check out this shot of a meteor, taken by NASA astronaut Ron Garan from a window on the International Space Station.

That meteor was part of the Perseid shower, which peaked on Saturday. Got any good meteor-watching stories or photos? Share them in the comments!

Via Discovery News and Joanne Manaster

Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

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MORE: Event • meteor • photo • Science • Space

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groovehouse

My question is, what’s the other object above the meteor? UFO?
- http://www.nothinginside.net mindysan33
  
  Isn’t that mars? Looks too bright to be a star, but could be a planet…
  - Sagodjur
    
    “That’s no moon. It’s a space station!”
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Sparg-Otyebat/1818893984 Sparg Otyebat
  
  According to the Astronomy Picture of the Day guys it’s the star Arcturus.
  
  http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110817.html
screwt

What would happen if one of those hit the ISS? And what chance is there of that happening?

From the pic, the meteor looks (1) not so far away, and (2) like a GREAT BALL OF FIRE. I’d be crapping my pants. Equally I could believe that it’s actually tiny, and/or in the vast depths of space the chances of impact with the ISS are astronomically small. Can anyone put definite numbers on that?
- EH
  
  I think the chance of an asteroid hitting the ISS is about the same as throwing one piece of dust and hitting a specific piece of dust on the other side of the room.
  - Lobster
    
    That sounds about right. Unfortunately orbit is extremely dusty right now. If you count debris, that is.
- http://inchoate.myopenid.com/ Inchoate
  
  The always reliable Bad Astronomy blog has an interesting discussion of this picture, and addresses the probability of a meteor hitting the ISS (spoiler: very small).
Andy Pardue

My Wife and Daughter and I drove up to Pine mountain in Ventura County to watch the shower. The moon was to bright but we still saw some. The highlight was the space station blasting north to south right over us.
Guest

Wonderful. Wish I could visit that station… :(
http://www.justkyle.com Kyle Jones

I was at a friend’s birthday outside watching Goonies projected on their house when we saw a large bright streak across they sky, oblivious to the fact the Perseid shower was in full force
http://twitter.com/pleaseprint Mike McMahan

This is almost exactly the opening shot of Carpenter’s “The Thing”.
Cowicide

You ever seen what a meteor looks like… on weed?

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-K6lgAcJ5mEo/TeVA4o0MBEI/AAAAAAAAAD0/IMbgy28iNak/s400/jon-stewart-half-baked.jpg
Antinous / Moderator

Usually I have terrible luck with meteor showers, but this year I keep seeing big ones every time that I walk outside.
- Lobster
  
  Nah, that’s just bad luck. Terrible luck is getting HIT by a meteor.
futnuh

On 23 March 2001 I was on a Qantas flight from Sydney to LA. I know the date because they delayed the boarding call by an hour … to avoid the negligible chance that the aircraft would be struck by a deorbiting Mir space-station. I told them the risk was pretty well zero but it didn’t seem to matter. I also suggested we take a vote, “all waiting passengers in favor of possibly seeing an awesome ‘meteor’ shower?”. This, I inferred from their false grins, was the statement of a crazy person.
- futnuh
  
  Addendum: Once, after viewing a very disappointing Perseid meteor shower, I sent a letter to NASA suggesting that they send up 20 metric tons of gravel on the space shuttle as a contingency. No response.