- The astronomical name for a shooting star is a meteor. It is the flash of light you see in the sky when a meteoroid or a meteorite burns up as it enters the atmosphere.
- Meteorites are pieces of space rock that make it through the atmosphere and strike the Earth’s surface without completely vapouri zing. About 5,800 hit the Earth each year. Meteoroids vapourize before hitting Earth.
- The custom of wishing on a shooting star originated in England in the Middle Ages, when peasants believed meteors were heavenly souls coming to Earth to mark the birth of a new person.
- The odds of being killed by a meteorite are 10 trillion to one. You are roughly 1,000 times more likely to win a lottery.
- The Sudbury basin is thought to be the impact site of a meteorite with a diameter of more than 200 kilometres, possibly the largest to have ever struck Earth.
- In Islamic folklore, meteors were missiles launched at evil-doers (to use the current terminology) attempting to slip into the gates of heaven.
- To the Ojibwa, shooting stars were gifts sent to someone on Earth by the Great Spirit.
- Comets are pieces of rock less than two kilometres in diameter that orbit the sun. As a comet travels through space, material is blown away and forms a debris trail.
- Annual meteor showers occur when the Earth’s orbit passes through the trail of a comet. Shooting-star gazers can see more than 50 meteors per hour in mid-August during the Perseid meteor shower when the Earth crosses the path of the Swift-Tuttle comet.
- Bad Company’s 1975 song “Shooting Star” tells of the hazards of stardom and excess facing billboard-topping rockers. Their album burned up after hitting number three on the charts and they never reached such heights again.
This article first appeared in the Spring 2006 issue of Canoeroots Magazine. For more great content, subscribe to Canoeroots’ print and digital editions here.
