This fantastic 60s-style poster celebrated the 1986 encounter between Giotto - ESA's first deep-space mission - and Comet Halley, which took place in the night between 13-14 March 1986. The poster comprises an enlargement of an image of the comet nucleus taken by the Halley Multicolour Camera from a distance of about 25 700km; an artist's impression of the Giotto satellite is overlaid at right.
Giotto was designed to help solve the mysteries surrounding Comet Halley by passing as close as possible to the comet's nucleus; no one expected the spacecraft to survive its battering from comet dust during this encounter, but although Giotto was damaged during the flyby, most of its instruments remained operational. The mission was extended to allow an unprecedented encounter with a second comet, Grigg-Skjellerup, on 10 July 1992.
Giotto's 'firsts':
Giotto was operated from the European Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt, Germany.
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