Shooting stars are pretty cool. They light up the night sky with quick blazes across the horizon and you can wish on them (whether or not that wish comes true is to-be-determined). However, in reality, shooting stars are not something straight out of a fairy tale or Disney movie, but they are a result of the Earth and its atmosphere passing through a field of debris in space.

One of the most popular meteor showers and largest concentration of ‘shooting stars’ occurs every year during an annual event called the Perseid Meteor Shower. The perseid meteors are debris left behind from the Swift-Tuttle Comet, which last passed near earth in 1992. These meteoroids (as they’re known while they’re floating in space) are very small, generally the size of grains of sand that burn up when they come into contact with the Earth’s atmosphere. The speed relative to Earth that these meteoroids are traveling is roughly 133,000 mph. Fear not, as rarely do any of these leftover bits of comet reach the earth’s surface. If they do then they’re known as a meteorite.

According to NASA, when you watch a meteor shower, what you’re seeing is bits and pieces of comet debris collide and burn up in Earth’s atmosphere while traveling at around 37 miles per second. For a reference point, the speed of sound is: 0.213 miles per second. So these little teeny tiny grains of asteroid dust are actually moving pretty darn quick when they come into contact with Earth’s Atmosphere.

When humans have observed this phenomenon in the past, they named it based on the section of the sky that it seemed the shooting stars were coming from. This meteor shower is known as the Perseid Meteor Shower because they generally ‘originate’ from the direction of the Perseus Constellation. While the Perseus constellation is slightly challenging to find, conveniently it is very close to Cassiopeia and follows it across the night sky.

Now, how do you go out and find yourself a shooting star in the wild? Well, the Perseids occur every year from generally mid-July to late-August. This year, they will peak from August 11-13th. Generally around 12:00am to 5:00am is the best window to see shooting stars as the sky will be the darkest. The Perseus constellation and it’s easier to find partner, Cassiopeia, will be located in the Northern Hemisphere sky and a star-chart will make finding them much easier.

This year the moon will only be 10% illuminated, giving you some of the darkest possible night sky to help the Perseids shine through. During a dark year like this year, up to 100 meteors per hour should be visible, so keep your eyes peeled!