Meteor Shower Thrills Skywatchers 凌晨火流星掠過天際 多次爆閃引熱議

A meteor shower took place over Taiwan early on the morning of July 7. It was so bright that has caught the attention of many netizens. Experts say this kind of sighting is very rare, limited to two or three times a year.
 

A streak of light cuts across the night sky. Shooting stars were visible over Taiwan early on the morning of July 7 for around 40 seconds. There was also a series of firecracker-like explosions. Posts on the sighting were shared on Facebook.

It was the hugest I'd ever seen, and it lasted 30 to 40 seconds. You could also hear firecracker-like sounds like firecrackers that were very far away.

The Taipei Astronomical Museum, which documented the meteor shower, says the meteor shower was unusually bright.

You may have some stars disintegrating in mid-air or going through several disintegrations. That's why they become illuminated several times. This was an unusually bright meteor shower.

The meteor shower was so bright at certain points that buildings were illuminated. National Central University's Lulin Observatory posted a video of one particular star that seemed to explode four times.

This was a rare occurrence. You see it maybe two or three times a year. Generally speaking, if the star is sizeable enough and the explosion isn't large enough to disintegrate it, you could have meteorites falling to earth.

One expert says people that were not able to catch the meteor shower can check the websites of professional observatories.
 

一道亮光，劃破黑暗的天際，這是7號凌晨，出現在台灣上空的天文景觀「火流星」，過程持續快40秒，期間，還出現如放鞭炮的小爆炸聲音。有民眾目睹這個景象，上傳到臉書群組，引發熱烈討論。

火流星拍攝者表示：「很大顆，從來沒看過這麼大顆的流星。應該30、40秒，有聽到，像鞭炮聲，很遠的鞭炮聲那樣。」

台北市天文館、設在福壽山的流星監視攝影機，同步紀錄下這個天文奇景，強調這顆火流星亮度在負6到負8，是非常亮的流星。

台北市天文館助理研究員 李瑾表示：「甚至它們在半空中，因為它的那些顆粒，它可能會有崩解的這樣一個過程。它可能會經過不同幾次的崩解，所以它會有時候，會出現好幾次的閃光，這個就是特別亮的火流星的一個現象。」

由於火流星的亮度很高，甚至在畫過天際時，照亮了屋子，中央大學天文所的鹿林天文台，也PO出相關畫面，認為這是「超級猛的一顆」，還爆閃4次。

中央大學鹿林天文台長 林宏欽表示：「這樣的超級火流星事件，非常罕見。一年中，可能只有兩、三次，那一般來說的話，假如說，這個流星體夠大的話，他沒有燃燒完，會掉到地面，就變成殞石。」

專家分析，這次火流星是屬於偶發性的流星，民眾如果凌晨無法親見目擊，也可透過專業天文台公布的紀錄影像，享受這個罕見的天文這個罕見的天文景觀。