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Cometa Halley

Comet Halley is famous for being the first comet shown to orbit the Sun in a predictable periodic orbit. It was last seen in 1986 and will next appear in 2061. English astronomer Edmond Halley used Newton's theories in 1705 to predict Halley's orbit and return, establishing it as the first known "periodic comet" now named after him. During its 1986 appearance, it was studied by an international fleet of spacecraft including Giotto, which obtained the first images of a comet nucleus.

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9 views

Cometa Halley

Comet Halley is famous for being the first comet shown to orbit the Sun in a predictable periodic orbit. It was last seen in 1986 and will next appear in 2061. English astronomer Edmond Halley used Newton's theories in 1705 to predict Halley's orbit and return, establishing it as the first known "periodic comet" now named after him. During its 1986 appearance, it was studied by an international fleet of spacecraft including Giotto, which obtained the first images of a comet nucleus.

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daniela grigorcea
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1P/Halley

In 1986, the European spacecraft Giotto became one of the first spacecraft ever to encounter
and photograph the nucleus of a comet, passing and imaging Halley's nucleus as it receded
from the Sun. Credit: Halley Multicolor Camera Team, Giotto Project, ESA | More about this
image

NEXT CLOSE APPROACH TO THE SUN


Comet Halley
Perihelion:July 27, 2061
37YRS
09MOS
28DAYS
17HRS
00MINS
12SECS

Halley is often called the most famous comet because it marked the first time astronomers
understood comets could be repeat visitors to our night skies. Astronomers have now linked
the comet's appearances to observations dating back more than 2,000 years.

Halley was last seen in Earth's skies in 1986 and was met in space by an international fleet of
spacecraft. It will return in 2061 on its regular 76-year journey around the Sun.

The History of Halley's Comet

Until the time of English astronomer Edmond Halley (1656-1742), comets were believed to
make only one pass through the solar system.

But in 1705, Halley used Isaac Newton's theories of gravitation and planetary motions to
compute the orbits of several comets. Halley found the similarities in the orbits of bright
comets reported in 1531, 1607, and 1682 and he suggested that the trio was actually a single
comet making return trips. Halley correctly predicted the comet would return in 1758.
History's first known "periodic" comet was later named in his honor.
The comet has since been connected to ancient observations going back more than 2,000
years. It is featured in the famous Bayeux tapestry, which chronicles the Battle of Hastings in
1066.

In 1986, an international fleet spacecraft met the comet for an unprecedented study from a
variety of vantage points. The science fleet included Japan's Suisei and Sakigake spacecraft,
the Soviet Union's Vega 1 and Vega 2 (repurposed after a successful Venus mission), the
international ISEE-3 (ICE) spacecraft, and the European Space Agency's Giotto. NASA's
Pioneer 7 and Pioneer 12 also contributed to the bounty of science data collected.

A panel from the Bayeux tapestry showing people looking at what would later be known as
Halley's comet. Credit: By Myrabella - Own work, Public Domain

Halley's Connection to Meteor Showers

Each time Halley returns to the inner solar system its nucleus sprays ice and rock into space.
This debris stream results in two weak meteor showers each year: the Eta Aquarids in May
and the Orionids in October.

Size

Halley's dimensions are about 9.3 by 5 miles (15 kilometers by 8 kilometers). It is one of the
darkest, or least reflective, objects in the solar system. It has an albedo of 0.03, which means
that it reflects only 3% of the light that falls on it.

Orbit

Comet Halley moves backward (opposite to Earth's motion) around the Sun in a plane tilted
18 degrees to that of the Earth's orbit. Halley's backward, or retrograde, motion is unusual
among short-period comets, as its greatest distance from the Sun (aphelion) is beyond the
orbit of Neptune.
Halley's orbit period is, on average, 76 Earth years. This corresponds to an orbital
circumference around the Sun of about 7.6 billion miles (12.2 billion kilometers). The period
varies from appearance to appearance because of the gravitational effects of the planets.
Measured from one perihelion passage to the next, Halley's period has been as short as 74.42
years (1835-1910) and as long as 79.25 years (451-530).

The comet's closest approach to Earth occurred in 837, at a distance of 0.033 AU (3.07
million miles or 4.94 million kilometers). At that time, April 10, 837, Halley reached a total
apparent brightness of about magnitude -3.5, nearly that of Venus at greatest brilliance. The
light of Halley was spread over an extended area, however, so its surface brightness was less
than that of Venus.

During its 1986 appearance, Halley's nearest approach to Earth occurred on the outbound leg
of the trip at a distance of 0.42 AU (39 million miles or 63 million kilometers). It was slightly
brighter than the north star Polaris but again spread over a much larger area than a point-like
star.

At aphelion in 1948, Halley was 35.25 AU (3.28 billion miles or 5.27 billion kilometers)
from the Sun, well beyond the distance of Neptune. The comet was moving 0.91 kilometers
per second (2,000 mph). At perihelion on Feb. 9, 1986, Halley was only 0.5871 AU (87.8
million km: 54.6 million miles) from the Sun, well inside the orbit of Venus. Halley was
moving at 122,000 mph (54.55 kilometers per second).

Lifetime

With each orbit around the Sun, a comet the size of Halley loses an estimated 3 to 10 feet (1
to 3 meters) of material from the surface of its nucleus. Thus, as the comet ages, it eventually
dims in appearance and may lose all the ices in its nucleus. The tails disappear at that stage,
and the comet finally evolves into a dark mass of rocky material or perhaps dissipates into
dust.

Scientists calculate that an average periodic comet lives to complete about 1,000 trips around
the Sun. Halley has been in its present orbit for at least 16,000 years, but it has shown no
obvious signs of aging in its recorded appearances.

How Comet 1P/Halley Got Its Name

Comets are usually named for their discoverer(s) or for the name of the observatory or
telescope used in the discovery. Since Halley correctly predicted the return of this comet –
the first such prediction – it is named to honor him. The letter "P" indicates that Halley is a
"periodic" comet. Periodic comets have an orbital period of less than 200 years.

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