Stay Up All Night to Watch Geminid Meteor Shower: NASA

The Geminid meteor showers are going to make its annual appearance and put up some spectacular cosmic fireworks, just in time for Christmas.

NASA in its latest announcement is asking all sky-watchers to 'Stay Up all Night' and witness nature's newest attraction early next week. This year's annual Geminid meteor shower will peak on the night of Dec 13-14, 2012, and it is considered as the most intense meteor shower.

People can chat with NASA astronomer Bill Cooke, Danielle Moser and Rhiannon Blaauw who will be available to answer to all queries about the cosmic event through live web shat on Dec. 13 from 11 p.m. until 3 a.m. EST.

The best time to view the show will be near 1-2 a m local time where the sky watchers can view nearly 100-200 meteors per hour. This year's meteor shower is expected to last for several days from Dec 12-16.

 "This year, the presence of a bright moon may make 4 a.m. to dawn a better time. Find a place away from city lights, and then allow 45 minutes for your eyes to adjust to darkness. Lie on your back and look straight up because no binoculars are needed. You might want to bring a blanket and some hot chocolate because baby, it's cold outside! Enjoy the show!" reads a statement on NASA website.

Unlike the other meteor showers that originate from a comet, the Geminid Meteor shower comes from a rocky object called 3200 Phaethon that sheds dusty debris is small quantity. This rocky object has an eccentric orbit and sheds meteors as it gets closer to the Sun.

"The Geminids are my favorite because they defy explanation," said Bill Cooke, lead for NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office. "Of all the debris streams Earth passes through every year, the Geminids are by far the most massive. When we add up the amount of dust in the Geminid stream, it outweighs other streams by factors of 5 to 500."

The 3200 Phaethobn was discovered in 1983 by NASA's IRAS. With a mean diameter of 5.1 km the rocky object was classified as asteroid.

Also NASA helps to get a view of the meteor shower by the live Ustream feed of the skies over Marshall Space Flight Center that will be embedded on page on the night of the chat.