Perseids: An enlightening experience

Friday, Aug. 9, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

One of the most spectacular meteor showers of the year will be appearing in Southern Nevada's skies Sunday and Monday.

For Edward Kantor, the Perseids offer a dozen good reasons to escape the Las Vegas lights and gaze to the heavens.

"I saw the Perseids once in Death Valley," said Kantor, who's going back this weekend. "The sky was so black you could see every star. I've seen 12 of these and 1994 was the best."

In 1992, Kantor went to Overton, but at 60 miles northeast of Las Vegas, there's still too much city light skewing the view.

Astronomer Robert Pippin, manager of the Planetarium at the Community College of Southern Nevada, had the same advice. Get as far away from city lights as possible, bring lounge chairs and something cool to drink and forget the telescopes.

"You want to get somewhere where the sky is wide open," he said.

Each Aug. 11 and 12, the Earth plunges through debris left by a close encounter with the Swift-Tuttle comet, Pippin explained. The debris orbits the sun, and as the Earth rotates around the sun, the planet passes through those floaters.

The Perseid meteors are named after the constellation Perseus, where the starry show first appears. These streaks of light -- 200 to 500 an hour -- may stream across any part of the sky.

This year promises great viewing in the Southwest because there's no moon.

Some of Kantor's friends have already planned for this weekend's spectacle. There's not a vacant room in Death Valley, Stovepipe Wells or other Mojave Desert towns.

Joy Eckhardt, former vice president of Southwest Gas Corp., plans to go to Death Valley with her husband and watch shooting stars for the first time on her birthday Sunday.

Rose Ellis, librarian at the Meadows High School, plans to go to Big Bear Lake with her husband and celebrate their honeymoon by watching this year's shower.

Best views begin after midnight Sunday because Southern Nevada will turn into the oncoming stream of comets colliding with Earth's atmosphere.

If you don't mind the heat in the 90s after dark, Stovepipe Wells or Furnace Creek in Death Valley National Park is ideal. Death Valley goes as dark as it gets with no moon, no city lights, no humidity and no air pollution.

Two miles away from Stovepipe Wells -- 20 minutes from Furnace Creek -- sand dunes offer a cradle for Perseid watchers with blankets and cool drinks.

"You never forget the first time you see a shooting star," Kantor said.

You may not see 2,000 shooting stars a minute like folks in the Southwest did in November 1966, but that 32-year phenomenon will happen again on Nov. 17, 1998. So mark your celestial calendar.

That's the Leonid meteor shower in Nov. 17, 1998, or Nov. 17, 1999, or maybe 2000, Kantor said.

"Wouldn't it be great if Las Vegas shut off all the lights for that one night?" Kantor asked. "The hotels could offer the best meteor show of the century and they'd sell out."