{"id":158498,"date":"2025-11-02T08:50:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-02T08:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/158498\/"},"modified":"2025-11-02T08:50:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-02T08:50:08","slug":"in-november-we-get-one-of-the-years-best-celestial-light-shows-limerick-astronomy-club","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/158498\/","title":{"rendered":"In November we get one of the year\u2019s best celestial light shows &#8211; Limerick Astronomy Club"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As the nights draw in this November, we get a front-row seat to one of the year\u2019s best <a href=\"https:\/\/www.limerickleader.ie\/section\/230\/community\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">celestial<\/a> light shows: the Leonid meteor shower. Peaking around November 17, these &#8216;shooting stars&#8217; are debris left behind by Comet Tempel-Tuttle. Although the predicted rate for 2025 is modest, they are famously fast-travelling at about 70 kilometres per second and often leave bright trails across the sky. Find a clear spot and enjoy this dramatic natural fireworks display!<br \/>But November also marks a momentous anniversary for human-made space history: the day we first successfully landed on a comet.<\/p>\n<p><strong>READ MORE<\/strong>:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.limerickleader.ie\/news\/community\/1925312\/limerick-items-to-take-pride-of-place-in-new-dublin-exhibition.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Limerick items to take pride of place in Dublin exhibition<\/a><br \/>Ten years ago, on November 12, 2014, the European Space Agency\u2019s Rosetta mission achieved the seemingly impossible. <br \/>After a ten-year journey, its little washing-machine-sized lander, Philae, successfully touched down on Comet 67P\/Churyumov-Gerasimenko &#8211; a strangely shaped, 4km-long lump of ice and dust often described as looking like a giant rubber duck .<br \/>The drama was immense. Philae\u2019s harpoons, meant to anchor it to the comet&#8217;s low-gravity surface, failed to fire. <br \/>It bounced twice before settling in a shadowy spot, landing awkwardly on its side near a cliff. This meant its solar panels couldn&#8217;t fully recharge, giving scientists only 48 hours to collect data.<br \/>Despite the nail-biting finish, Philae sent back invaluable information. Perhaps its most surprising finding came from Rosetta itself, which analysed the comet\u2019s water vapour. <br \/>It revealed that the isotopic signature of the water was vastly different from water on Earth. <br \/>This finding directly challenged the popular theory that comets like 67P delivered the majority of water to our planet billions of years ago.<br \/>It&#8217;s a fantastic reminder that the smallest robots can often deliver the biggest cosmic surprises!<br \/>The Limerick Astronomy Club meets next on the first Thursday in November, in Mary Immaculate College, Room 202 at 8pm. We&#8217;d love to welcome you and embark on this cosmic journey together. Reach out to us at limerickastronomyclub@gmail.com for more info.<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n<p>ADVERTISEMENT &#8211; CONTINUE READING BELOW<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the nights draw in this November, we get a front-row seat to one of the year\u2019s best&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":158499,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[18,19,17,1844,45479,133],"class_list":{"0":"post-158498","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-limerick","12":"tag-mary-immaculate-college","13":"tag-science"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115479250529730895","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158498","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158498"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158498\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}