What causes shooting stars?

When tiny space debris—usually from comets or asteroids—enters the Earth's atmosphere and heats up owing to friction, it results in shooting stars, also known as meteors. Meteors are the light streaks

they produce. Shooting stars are bright streaks of light created when tiny space rock and dust particles reach the atmosphere quickly. These meteoroids originate from comets and asteroids,

which are space rock fragments that circle the sun and drift between the planets. As they travel, some rock and dust fragments break off

from them because of temperature variations as they approach and depart from the Sun. Some of these boulders are occasionally

thrown at Earth and enter its atmosphere. The bigger and heavier meteoroids possess a huge iron core that cannot be evaporated by atmospheric friction,

while the smaller meteoroids will burn at high altitudes in the atmosphere. They create craters when they land on the Earth. We categorize these as meteorites.

Want More Stories Like This

"