The space company ALE is preparing its first artificial meteor shower in Japan.

In a natural environment, shooting stars appear when the Earth passes through them a cloud of debris left behind by comets and asteroids in their orbit. The particles emit light because they heat up quickly as they travel through the atmosphere at high speed.

For this artificial project, called ‘SKY CANVAS‘, replicating meteorite particles will be installed on a satellite 400 km high and then released over a designated area.

These metal particles become spheres with a diameter of 1 cm and a mass of a few grams. The spheres have a secret chemical formula that causes them to ignite through the friction of reentry, at speeds of up to 5 miles per second, he explains. Daily mail.

ALE says these particles will travel more slowly and will glow longer than natural shooting stars, each for a maximum of ten seconds. They will be visible to stargazers in an area of ​​200 km.

The ingredients in the pellets can be modified to change the color of each glowing stripe, meaning a multi-colored fleet of shooting stars can be created.

According to those in charge, after about two years in orbit, the backpack-sized satellite will re-enter the atmosphere and disintegrate completely, preventing it from becoming space junk.

An asteroid hit Earth off the coast of Iceland on Friday, just two hours after being discovered by an astronomer.

What is the difference between an asteroid, a meteorite and other space rocks?

The light show is not just for stargazers, but will also help collect data on the third layer of Earth’s atmosphere – the ‘mesosphere’. This is not an easy region to study, as weather balloons and airplanes cannot fly high enough to reach it, but it is too low to be observed by satellites.