Meteor Shower — Atmospheric Entry & Radiant Physics (2D)

This 2D companion strips the meteor shower down to the physics that actually produces the light show. Each meteoroid is entered into the atmosphere at a real speed and angle and integrated forward with the single-body ablation equations: an exponential atmosphere drives drag deceleration and mass loss proportional to rho·v³, which is what makes a meteor flare to peak brightness and then burn out at a specific altitude rather than simply drawing a streak of fixed length. All of it is rendered on a genuine radiant sky map — a fisheye, zenith-centred projection in which every meteor's geodesic path is computed from a single radiant point, so the streaks fan outward exactly the way real parallel cometary debris does when seen in perspective from the ground. Perseids, Leonids and Geminids presets set historically accurate entry speeds, angles and radiant positions.