A meteor shower is when earth encounters many meteoroids at once. Meteors are called shooting stars because they fall towards earth the resistance of the air on the rock makes it extremely hot. We encounter many meteors at once because Meteoroids (meteors traveling in space) can orbit the Sun at a velocity of up to 42 kilometers per second (26 miles per second). When these meteoroids encounter the Earth, they may enter the atmosphere a speeds up to 72 kilometers per second (45 miles per second). most meteoroids traveling through space are particles of interplanetary collisions that occurred enos ago. larger meteoroids enter the atmosphere, they often leave a smoke trail behind. This trail can last from a few seconds to many minutes. These particles were thrown into random orbits around the sun and they account for majority of the meteors we see. Other meteoroids are formed by the disintegration of comets and asteroids.
A meteor shower is a meteoroid shower meteors are called meteoroids because they are also know as stars. We encounter many meteors at once because they constantly are hitting each other which comes from the term shooting star. So essentially when you are looking at stars you are looking at meteoroids when one more more or several meteoroids clash into each other this causes the falling star affect which causes the shower and so on.
