How to watch meteor shower online if clouds get in the way

If you live in the Los Angeles area and want to watch tonight’s May Camelopardalids meteor shower, your best bet might be watching this video stream or this one.

Cloud cover may block stargazers who want to watch it live from their backyards.

Experts said heading away from city lights and low clouds -- perhaps to mountain areas or deserts like Joshua Tree -- will provide the best views in the region.

The shower could produce up to 200 meteors per hour.

Dubbed May Camelopardalids (Camel-Oh-par-dalids), the stream of debris was left in the wake of a comet -- named 209P/LINEAR -- hundreds of years ago and should be visible across North America.

However, astronomers are unsure of how much dust has been left by the periodic comet because its orbit has usually been taken out by Jupiter’s gravity.

As for the possible meteor shower, Carol Smith of the National Weather Service said low-hanging clouds will blanket the Los Angeles Basin and most of Southern California from about 11 p.m. Friday to 1 a.m. Saturday. The meteor shower’s peak viewing times could stretch from midnight Friday to dawn Saturday.

“There will be a pretty decent inland push of marine clouds ... from the stratus coming in off the ocean,” Smith said. “The clouds will start going across the valleys first, San Gabriel and then San Fernando.”