Abstract
We use statistics on the nuclear magnitudes of Jupiter Family comets to derive the number of km-sized members with perihelion distances less than 2 AU. When coupled with impact rates per comet taken from Levison et al. (2000), and with our estimate of the number of dormant comets in similar orbits yielding a dormant/active ratio of about 2, we find a terrestrial impact rate of about 1.10−6 per year. This is already significant (~ 20 – 50%) compared with the total estimated impact rate by km-sized bodies from cratering statistics, and we estimate that further contributions by Halley-type and long-period comets are also substantial. Thus, in broad agreement with a number of earlier investigators, we find that comets yield a large, perhaps dominant, contribution to km-sized terrestrial impactors.
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Rickman, H., Fernández, J.A., Tancredi, G., Licandro, J. (2001). The Cometary Contribution to Planetary Impact Rates. In: Marov, M.Y., Rickman, H. (eds) Collisional Processes in the Solar System. Astrophysics and Space Science Library, vol 261. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-0712-2_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-010-0712-2_8
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