What is a shooting star?

Did you know that a shooting star actually has nothing to do with a star!!

A shooting star is actually another name for a meteoroid that burns up as it passes through the earth’s atmosphere. A meteoroid is tiny bits of dust and rock. Most of the shooting stars that we see are known and are meteoroids. These meteoroids can be as small as a piece/grain of sand and as large as a boulder. If they are smaller or the size of a peice/grain of sand astronomers call them interplanetary dust. Whereas if they are larger or the size of a boulder astronomers call them asteroids.

If any of the meteoroid survives burning up it could actually hit the Earth, that remaining bit is then called a meteorite. At certain times of year, you are likely to see a great number of meteors in the night sky. These events are called meteor showers and they occur when the Earth passes through the trail of debris left by a comet as it orbits the Sun. A meteoroid becomes a meteor when it stikes the atmosphere and leaves a bright trail behind it.