{"copyright":"\nTomáš Slovinský\n","date":"2025-12-15","explanation":"Where a re all of these meteors coming from? In terms of direction on the sky, the poin ted answer is the constellation of Gemini. That is why the major meteor shower in December is known as the Geminids -- because shower meteors all appear to com e from a radiant toward Gemini. Three dimensionally, however, sand-sized debris expelled from the unusual asteroid 3200 Phaethon follows a well-defined orbit ab out our Sun, and the part of the orbit that approaches Earth is superposed in fr ont of the constellation of Gemini. Therefore, when Earth crosses this orbit, th e radiant point of falling debris appears in Gemini. Featured here is a composit e of many images taken over the past few days through dark skies from Slovakia a nd capturing the snow-covered peaks of the Belianske Tatra mountains Numerous b right meteor streaks from the Geminids meteor shower are visible. Orion is visi ble above the horizon, while the bright star nearest the radiant is Castor. A POD Review: RJN's Night Sky Network Lecture","hdurl":"https:\/\/apod.nasa.gov\/a pod\/image\/2512\/GeminidWinter_Slovinsky_1303.jpg","media_type":"image","servic e_version":"v1","title":"Gemini Meteors over Snow Capped Mountains","url":"https :\/\/apod.nasa.gov\/apod\/image\/2512\/GeminidWinter_Slovinsky_960.jpg"}
