Residents of Ontario may be able to witness a spectacular celestial display as early as Tuesday morning, an event astronomers call a "meteor storm."

Dan Riskin, a science and technology specialist for CTV News, said astronomers expect that around one o'clock Tuesday morning, people might witness this rare event, or perhaps see nothing significant at all.

Astronomers say they expect the Earth to pass through the debris trails on Monday night left by a broken comet that fragmented in 1995.

The broken comet, named Comet 73P / Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 [SW3], was first discovered in 1930. The comet was faint most of its years until it broke apart in 1995.

Riskin said Monday afternoon: "If the pieces are the right size, and if the pieces are moving at the right speed, which we really do not know, but it is possible to get something beyond meteor showers." "We can get what is called a meteor storm with thousands of meteors per hour, peaking around 1 a.m. Toronto time."

By comparison, scientists say the regular meteor fall averages one meteor per minute, or about 60 per hour. However, the significance of the event greatly depends on the speed and direction of the fragments.

Riskin said: "If you want to wake up at midnight, go outside around one o'clock, try to find a place free of some light pollution and look at the sky." "It will be a great show or maybe it won't be anything at all, and no one knows."