Early May is a good time to watch for a powerful yet often elusive meteor shower, the annual Eta Aquariids. They’re a prolific, yet often elusive for northern hemisphere observers. If skies are clear, watch for a strong annual meteor shower that’s attained an almost mythical status: the May Eta Aquariids . The Eta Aquariid meteor shower is active from April 19th until May 28th, with the key night being the evening of May 5th into the morning of May 6th. This is a strong shower, with a Zenithal Hourly Rate (ZHR) topping out on some years at 60-100 meteors an hour. The Eta Aquariids actually take third place in terms of strong annual meteor showers, right behind the August Perseids and the December Geminids. The shower has a broad peak, and produces swift moving (65.4 kilometers a second) meteors often leaving glowing, persistent trains. But the May Eta Aquariids have a PR problem, at least in the eyes of northern hemisphere observers. First off, the Eta Aquariids are a rare, southern hemisphere shower.…