This week’s astrological event only comes once in a blue moon.
Meteor scientists Peter Jenniskens and Esko Lyytinen have predicted a rare “Unicorn” meteor shower for this Thursday or Friday, depending on your location.
The short-lived peak outburst will likely last for just 15 minutes, with the entire shower lasting 40 minutes, the astronomers predict. If onlookers are lucky, the shower could shoot up to 400 meteors across the sky. Those in South America, the eastern portion of North America, western Europe and northwestern Africa will have the best views, CNN writes.
For those on Eastern time, look up at 11:50 p.m. — or 4:50 a.m. Universal time.
As for the exact origins of the shower, science does not yet have an explanation. “This outburst is caused by the dust released by a long period comet, but the comet itself is still unknown,” the astronomers write in a paper published in MeteorNews earlier this month.
The shower’s radiant point — or its celestial spot of origin in the sky — is in the Unicorn constellation, also known as the Monoceros, close to Orion the Hunter, CNN reports.
While a Monocertoid meteor shower occurs annually in late November, it usually only involves a few meteors. To have 400 at once is a rare occurrence not seen since 1995, according to the American Meteor Society.