The Disconnection Event of comet Halley on 1986 March 16.0

Details The Disconnection Event of comet Halley on 1986 March 16.0 The Disconnection Event of comet Halley on 1986 March 16.0

Apr 1994

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1994aj....107.1591y&link_type=abstract

The Astronomical Journal, vol. 107, no. 4, p. 1591-1596

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

10

Comet Tails, Halley'S Comet, Magnetic Field Reconnection, Neutral Sheets, Planetary Ionospheres, Planetary Magnetotails, Solar Wind, Explorer 50 Satellite, Interplanetary Magnetic Fields, Perihelions, Solar Orbits, Ultraviolet Radiation, Vega Project

Scientific paper

A series of the comet plasma tail Disconnection Events (DEs) observed during the comet Halley 1985-1986 apparition has been analyzed in order to more clearly understand the mechanism by which these DEs occur. In this paper, we report the results of the analysis of one such DE which was observed from 16 March through 19 March 1986. From a kinematic analysis of the wide-field photographic images from 1986 March 16 through 19, we calculated the disconnection time of the 1986 March 16-19 DE to be March 16.0 (+/- 0.1). The solar wind conditions around comet Halley, inferred by corotation of IMP-8 data to the comet, were such that (1) comet Halley had just crossed the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) sector boundary; (2) the solar wind density was approximately 7 cm-3, (3) the solar wind speed was approximately 530 km s-1; (4) the IMF magnitude was approximately 7 nT. One would not expect these conditions to have caused the DE via mechanisms such as pressure effects. Given these conditions, we conclude that the most likely cause of the March 16.0 DE was a mechanism associated with a sector-boundary crossing, such as the front-side magnetic reconnection model of Niedner & Brandt (1978).

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