The design that came into being was a small spinning spacecraft that would carry inflatable plastic tubes. During the flyby the tubes would be exposed to comet dust in the coma of Halley. The particles would penetrate the tubes, vaporize and the comet vapor would condense on the inside of the tubes. This was called atomized sample return and it would provide direct information on the elemental and isotopic composition of Halley. The mission was often called Halley Earth Return or HER.

Another JPL Halley mission studied at that time was called HIM, Halley Intercept Mission. Neither HIM or HER ever got off the drawing board. The US failed to be included in a spacecraft that flew past Halley in 1986. ISEE was sent on its many Lunar encounters and in 1985 it flew by comet Giacobini-Zinner. Although it was still the same spacecraft, it was renamed ICEE (International Sun Earth Explorer) and it did make a distant upstream journey near Halley. Although, it never was close enough to detect the comet or collect samples.

The Halley efforts did help produce the idea that a low cost sample return mission could be done from a comet. Unlike other bodies, comets release matter into space, and a simple spacecraft just flying by can snatch samples without the complex landing and surface operations required for sample return missions to the Moon, Mars and asteroids.

One of the most negative aspects of the atomized sample return concept was that the sample was vaporized by the high speed of collection. This process would destroy the valuable chemical, structural and mineralogical information recorded in the particles. Information on the nature of comets and their formation is recorded at very small scale. It is like having the history of the world on a CD with all information recorded at very tiny scale. If the CD is preserved its tiny dots can be read. If the CD is damaged, melted or vaporized, the information is lost.

How do you catch comets in space?

Click on: To Catch Comets in Space