Dust environment models for comet P/Halley: Support for targeting of the GIOTTO S/C

In March 1985 ESA's GIOTTO spacecraft will fly by P/Halley's nucleus at a distance of a few hundred kilometres. The near nucleus dust environment the probe will traverse poses a hazard with respect to physical damage as well as to attitude disturbance with the possible loss of ground station contact. To predict S/C survivability and dust impact rates for the experiments, a model of the spatial distribution of the dust in the nucleus' vicinity is required. In the ‘dynamic’ model, the local spatial dust density is derived from exact expressions for the dust particle dynamic motion. The model has been implemented in a software system which allows for fast simulations of a cometary fly-by.