Lynette Solomon, age 8, of Tucson, Arizona for her question:

What really happens when a star falls?

A real star twinkles from far away in the sky. It is an enormous bonfire, millions of times bigger than the earth. If it came crashing down, it would burn up our whole world. But this cannot happen because every star has to stay up there in~its proper place. So the things we call falling stars are not real stars. They just look like stars for a few moments. Most of them are like little grains of sand. They look so big and bright because they catch on fire. This happens when they come falling down through air, miles and miles above our heads.

Most of them burn to dust and ashes, high above the ground. This is why they seem to disappear after a few moments. The many small falling stars burn to dust. At last their dusty ashes fall down on the earth. If one is as big as a pebble, maybe only part of it burns up on the way down. The rest of it plonks on the land or splashes into the sea.