Super Moon, Perseids to Light Up Sky Sunday

It will be quite the spectacular nature show on Sunday.

The biggest and brightest full moon of the year will light up the sky. Coincidentally, the annual Perseid Meteor Shower is set to peak also on Sunday.

The combination of these astronomical events is both and good, NASA experts say: The good is obvious (two events at the same time). The bad news is that “lunar glare wipes out the black-velvety backdrop required to see faint meteors and sharply reduces counts,” Bill Cooke of Nasa’s Meteroid Environment Office said in a statement on NASA’s site.

NBC 7 Meteorologist Jodi Kodesh said a “super moon” occurs any time the moon is closer than 360,000 km to the Earth.

We had one just a month ago. Experts say the one on Sunday will be the biggest of the year.

As for the Perseids, they will appear from Sunday to Tuesday, shooting across the sky at 140,000 mph.

The meteors come via the Comet Swift-Tuttle, a grouping of dust grains that circle the sun every 133 years and get their name from the ancient Greek hero who slayed Medusa.

In San Diego, watch for the fun to start when the moon rises at 7:34 p.m.

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