00:00Want to fall in love with the night sky all over again? Then check this out.
00:04Astrophotographer Osama Fathi captured this incredible view of Perseid meteors cutting
00:08through star trails above Egypt's western desert overnight on August 13th to 14th.
00:13Just one night after the shower reached peak activity in the dark moonless skies following
00:18the August new moon. Fathi captured the star trails over 240 consecutive 25 second exposures,
00:24which recorded the apparent motion of the stars in Earth sky as they circled around the celestial
00:28North Pole. The length of each star trail reveals the extent to which the star moved over the course
00:33of the 100 minute shoot, and Fathi wasn't alone beneath the desert skies as he photographed that
00:38ancient starlight. Capturing this photo in Egypt's western desert during the Perseids was an unforgettable
00:43experience, Fathi told Space.com in an email. The night was exceptionally clear and I was
00:49surrounded by around 200 fellow astronomy enthusiasts sharing stories, stargazing and photographing the
00:54sky. Perseid meteors appear as unbroken streaks of light, captured in a single exposure as tiny
00:59particles, often no larger than a grain of sand, burned up in Earth's atmosphere in the blink of an
01:04eye. Dotted trails closer to the horizon on the other hand depict the trajectories of satellites as
01:09they pass silently over Egypt's western desert. Now a view this complex and beautiful can't be captured all
01:15at once. Fathi had to snap the artfully lit landscape and the starscape above separately before combining or
01:22stacking hundreds of images into a single mesmerizing nightscape that highlights the beauty of the
01:27desert scene, the rotation of Earth and the wonder of the natural night show of the Perseid meteor
01:32shower that we experience each year as Earth passes through the stream of debris left in the wake of
01:36the wandering comet 109p Swift-Tuttle. Be sure to head on over to space.com for more stunning astrophotos
01:42along with all the latest news in spaceflight and astronomy.
