Meteors From Halley's Comet Fly Over a UK Medieval Church

It's not usual that star gazers in the northern hemisphere get to see such a clear night sky show of meteors from Halley's Comet in May, but this sequence was captured in the churchyard of  St Barbara's, a medieval parish still in use in Ashton under Hill. The village in Worcestershire is about 40 miles from the University of Oxford, where Edmond Halley taught when he published his theory of the orbital period for the comet that would one day bear his name.

This time-lapse sequence combines hundreds of 25-second exposure snapshots ending with dawn on May 6. If you'd like another go at seeing some pieces of Halley's Comet this year—or any year—in October you can look for the Orionid meteor shower, which can offer an even more abundant series of flashes in the sky.