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Saturday, August 12, 2028 · 839 days away
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Perseid Meteor Storm Possible
Event overview
Possible Perseid meteor outburst from a dense 1479 dust trail of comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle that Earth is modelled to cross on the night of 11–12 August 2028 — with rates potentially exceeding 1,000 meteors per hour, the strongest Perseid display since the 1990s.
A possible Perseid meteor storm on the night of Friday 11 August into Saturday 12 August 2028, when Earth's orbit is modelled to graze a dense dust trail laid down by comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle during its 1479 perihelion passage. Outburst rates have been forecast in the 1,000+ meteors per hour range — what would be the strongest Perseid display since the 1990s and one of the headline night-sky events of the decade.
The Perseids are the most-watched annual meteor shower in the Northern Hemisphere. Their parent body is comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle, a 26-km nucleus on a 133-year orbit. Each August Earth passes through the comet's recent debris stream, producing typical zenithal hourly rates around 100. Outburst years occur when Earth happens to cross a denser, older filament — a discrete trail of dust shed centuries earlier and slowly disturbed by Jupiter's gravity into a narrow ribbon Earth's orbit can intersect.
Meteor-stream modellers — Jérémie Vaubaillon (IMCCE), Mikhail Maslov, Mikiya Sato and Esko Lyytinen — have all flagged the 1479 trail as a candidate for an August 2028 encounter. Predicted rates and the exact time of peak vary across models from a tens-per-hour enhancement up to a 1,000-plus storm; convergence between independent predictors raises confidence.
The International Meteor Organization (imo.net) publishes the canonical annual Perseid forecast. The American Meteor Society, the British Astronomical Association meteor section, NASA's All-Sky Fireball Network, the Global Meteor Network and amateur radio meteor-scatter observers all contribute real-time rate measurements. Live streams from the Subaru Telescope, Lowell Observatory and Slooh typically run on the peak night.
Pair with Perseid meteor shower 2026, Mars opposition 2027 and the Tianwen-3 Mars sample-return launch for the cluster of marquee astronomy events around the late-2020s.
When is the predicted outburst? Night of 11–12 August 2028. How strong could it get? Models suggest 1,000+ meteors per hour at peak. Is the prediction certain? No — meteor outbursts depend on dust-trail densities that are inherently uncertain. Multiple independent forecasts agree, which is encouraging. Where to watch? Anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere with dark skies; the radiant in Perseus is highest before dawn.
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