What are shooting stars?

You look up at the night sky and — whoosh! — a bright line zips across it and is gone. People call it a shooting star. But here is a fun secret: it is not really a star.

Tiny bits zooming from space

Space is full of little pieces of rock and dust, some as small as a grain of sand. These bits float around for a long, long time. Sometimes one of them flies straight toward Earth and bumps into the air around our planet.

Why it glows

The little rock is moving super fast — faster than the fastest rocket. When it rushes into our thick air, it rubs against all those air bits and gets very, very hot. So hot that it begins to glow, leaving that bright streak you see for just a blink.

Then the tiny rock burns up completely and disappears. That is why the flash is so short!

Catching a wish

On some special nights, many of them come at once. We call that a meteor shower. If you lie on a blanket and look up, you might count dozens. Lots of people make a wish when they spot one.

Wonder fact: Most shooting stars are made by space bits no bigger than a pea — yet they light up the whole sky!