The girl remains unconscious. Her recovery will take months, her mother said. But the family is confident that the strong, healthy girl who paddled for Lanikai Canoe Club and turns 12 on Friday will make it. The annual Perseid meteor shower, one of the year's best, is scheduled to peak Monday night and in the wee hours Tuesday. Assuming the skies are clear, observers should be in for a treat as the meteors plunge from the heavens and burn up in Earth's atmosphere.
Most meteors are small, about the size of sand grains.
Yet they travel so fast, many miles per second, that they ignite brilliantly from friction with the air. They usually disappear in a fraction of a second. Wayne Itozuka, assistant manager at the Bishop Museum Planetarium, said this will be one of the best opportunities this year for watching meteor showers. He said that ideal viewing is away from city lights, at such locations as Sandy Beach and the Waianae and Windward coasts on Oahu. The shower will appear to emanate from the direction of the constellation Perseus, hence the name.