9 February 1986 · Greenwich

The comet waited for seventy-six years and barely seen

Five spacecraft from three space programmes were sent to meet it. One was hit by a one-gram grain of dust, tumbled and went silent — then came back to life half an hour later.

Halley’s Comet returns every seventy-five or seventy-six years — almost the only comet a person can see twice in a lifetime. A whole generation waited for the 1986 return, and it turned out to be the worst apparition for observers in two thousand years: Earth and the comet ended up on opposite sides of the Sun.

Its closest approach to us came only in April — 0.42 astronomical units. In 1910 it was 0.15, nearly three times closer; the comet’s tail swept over Earth and enterprising people sold “anti-comet pills”.

But 1986 was the first time anything flew close to it. Europe’s Giotto passed 596 kilometres from the nucleus. At that speed a one-gram grain of dust struck like a bullet: the craft tumbled and lost contact. Thirty-two minutes later it stabilised itself and carried on working.

The chart of that day

The Sun, Mercury, Venus, the Moon and Jupiter all gathered in Aquarius that day — five bodies inside one thirty-degree arc. Such a pile-up is called a stellium, and it does not happen every year.

How this reads

The King of Wands is the one who runs an undertaking that outlasts his own interest in it. A fitting card for an object whose returns are counted in generations, and for a mission planned over years for a few hours of approach.

Next perihelion: 28 July 2061. The comet is already on its way back — it passed its farthest point, 35 astronomical units, at the end of 2023.

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