Geminid meteor shower has captured the illuminated night sky across England

Photographers have managed to capture stunning images of the Geminid meteor shower that lit up the night sky over parts of England.

The celestial spectacle, which returns every December and is one of the last major meteor showers of the year, was visible in the early hours of Saturday.

The meteor shower was spotted by keen night sky photographers in parts of Northumberland and as far as Somerset.

The impressive images show white streaks of light running through the night sky.

Lee Reid, a keen photographer who lives near Newcastle, drove an hour to Lindisfarne in Northumberland, where he managed to find an open spot in the sky to catch a glimpse of the rain.

“I could actually see the meteors coming up and was obviously pretty excited,” Mr Reid, 43, told the PA news agency.

“Lindisfarne seems to be my lucky spot…there were clouds behind me but much of the sky, around 5.30am in the north-east, was clear.

“It’s amazing because if you plan things for a few days and hope and pray for clear skies, then it’s good when a plan comes together.”

Mr Reid, who works as an IT service delivery manager, said observing natural phenomena in the night sky inspired him to take up photography as a hobby.

He said after traveling to Iceland with photographer Will Cheung, a member of the Royal Photographic Society, to capture the Northern Lights, he bought his first camera.

“I bought a camera a week before my trip, mainly for the Northern Lights, and my photographic journey started from that point, March 2023,” he explained.

“Any chance I get now I find myself out in the dark skies, usually in Northumberland.”

Due to its intensity, the shower is called a “meteor storm” and is considered one of the most spectacular and consistent meteor showers.

Dr. Minjae Kim, a research fellow in the physics department at the University of Warwick, told PA: “The Geminids are one of the most spectacular meteor showers of the year.

“They are intriguing because they are one of the few large meteor showers associated with an asteroid 3200 Phaethon rather than a comet.”

The shower is known to produce more than 150 meteors per hour at its peak, although light pollution and other factors mean that the actual number of visible meteors is generally far lower in reality.

The Geminids descend from a rocky asteroid called 3200 Phaethon with a comet-like orbit and were first observed in 1862.

The meteors, small pieces of interplanetary debris, appear to radiate from near the bright star Castor in the constellation Gemini.

According to the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, meteors from the Geminid meteor shower are very bright, moderately fast and unusually colorful – mostly white, some yellow and some green, red and blue.

These colors are caused in part by the presence of trace amounts of metals such as sodium and calcium, the same effect used to color fireworks.

The Geminid meteor shower will be active until December 20th and is expected to peak between Saturday and Sunday (December 14th and 15th).