The annual Perseid meteor shower occurs when Earth passes through the debris trail left by Comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle. The event reached its peak overnight, coinciding with a new moon that offered optimal viewing conditions for stargazers as moonlight did not obstruct visibility. Witness the shooting stars in the images below.
In one photo, Perseid meteors streak across the sky at Mount Ramon in the Negev Desert, near Mitzpe Ramon, Israel, in the early hours of Thursday. Another image captures spectators observing a meteor streaking across the night sky at Visnjan Observatory in Croatia on a Wednesday evening.
Additional photos capture a meteor streaking above the Stone Dolls of Kuklica, near Kratovo, North Macedonia, and people gathered around the Monument to the Unknown Hero on Mount Avala near Belgrade, Serbia, to view the Perseid meteor shower. Another striking image shows a meteor streaking across the night sky above the megalithic stone walls of the ancient Illyrian city of Daorson near Stolac, in southern Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Furthermore, a green-tailed meteor and the trails of two satellites are visible from Jacobsdorf, Germany, during the Perseid meteor shower. Lastly, a Perseid meteor streaks across the night sky behind St. Mark’s Tower, a 17th-century coastal fortification near the village of Baħar iċ-Ċagħaq in Malta.