2024 was the first year I was able to get out and see the fantastic Perseid meteor shower. This meteor shower is an important fixture in the year for many astrophotographers and star gazers alike; it is a prolific meteor shower and is associated with the comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle. It is one of the best meteor showers of the year, and peaks in mid August (warmer nights!) with the radiant in the constellation Perseus. You can get up to 100 meteors an hour during the peak!

The radiant of a meteor shower is a point in the sky where the meteors appear to come from- the constellation Perseus for the Perseids. They can be visible all over the sky, however, and they are best viewed in the Northern hemisphere between during the predawn hours, but you can see meteors throughout the night.

As per usual, it was a battle with Mother Nature this night! A friend and I had to try and beat the clouds, and it was windy! We settled on the tip of the Llyn Peninsula looking towards Bardsey Island as the Milky Way lines up behind it in August. Towards Anglesey we could see lightening in the distance, which was rather unnerving. We actually came across a family who had headed up to watch the storm.

We tried to find as sheltered a spot as we could, but it is very exposed at this location. Although a summers evening, the wind made it bitterly cold. Tracking was also tricky due to the wind, I didn’t dare take my exposure over two minutes. We saw lots of meteors, and typically they were everywhere but in front of my camera! I was pleasantly surprised to have captured three meteors when I looked back at the images. This was taken with my Sigma 20mm Art lens. Hopefully in 2025 the weather and moon will be kind to me, as I would love to spend a full night watching this meteor shower.

Nightscapes