This is What a Meteor Shower Looks Like from Space

The 2014 Perseid meteor shower will peak this week, and astrophotographers the world over will be gazing up at the skies, cameras contending with a very bright moon in the hopes of capturing some bright streaks across the sky.

And while some of them will undoubtedly succeed in capturing some stunning shots, there’s one view not a single one will be able to get… the view of a meteor shower from above.

In this 2011 photograph (above) shared by APOD yesterday, as well as this 2012 photo (below) we dug out of the NASA archives, you can see what meteors look like from the International Space Station as they burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere.

The photo at the top was taken during the day by astronaut Ron Garan on August 13th, 2011 and shows a Perseid meteor from that year.

The second shot comes from famed astronaut Don Pettit on April 22nd, 2012. Pettit captured a Lyrid meteor during a 6-second exposure as the ISS flew past a sleepy, brightly lit Florida.

You can grab both at high-resolution and learn more about each shot by clicking here for Garan’s photograph and here for Pettit’s.

(h/t APOD)

Image credits: Photographs by Ron Garan and Don Pettit, courtesy of NASA