Seven celestial events to look for in the December night sky

The Geminid meteor shower is active from 4 to 20 December and is one of the last major showers of 2025. It peaks on 14 December when the Moon is waning crescent. This should help viewing conditions as there will be less light pollution at a time when the Geminids have been known to produce over 120 meteors per hour.

Meteors are pieces of debris that enter Earth’s atmosphere, passing through the debris of a comet or an asteroid at speeds of up to 150,000mph (241,000km/h), vaporising and causing beautiful streaks of light caused by particles as small as a grain of sand.

The meteors associated with the Geminids are some of the brightest and most abundant in the skies and appear as multi-coloured streaks of white, yellow, green, red and blue due to elements such as sodium and calcium found within the celestial debris.

They were first observed in 1862 and according to the Royal Observatory in Greenwich are thought to be intensifying every year.