Thousands of shooting stars to light up sky over Britain tonight

Night owls will be rewarded with spectacular multi-coloured meteors which might include occasional rapid bursts of two or three.

Sky watchers say that conditions are ‘perfect’ to view the Geminid meteor shower tonight – as long as the sky isn’t clouded over.

The best time to see the meteors will be at around 2am when the ‘radiant’ – the point in the sky from which the meteors appear to originate – is almost overhead, next to the constellation Gemini.

Robin Scagell, vice-president of the Society for Popular Astronomy, said: ‘It should be a good display, weather permitting – we might not be far off perfect conditions in the UK.

‘The constellation is very high in the sky and most of the Moon will have gone away. An average of one comet a minute would be a good rate, and that’s possible. You might also get little bursts of activity with two or three together.’

Meteor showers occur when the Earth ploughs through clouds of cometary dust.

The tiny particles, some no bigger than a grain of sand, burn up brightly as they enter the atmosphere.

-metro