The Sporadic Meteoroid Complex and Spacecraft Risk

Abstract

The meteoroid population in near-Earth space is typically broken down into two components: shower meteoroids which orbit in collimated streams, and the older sporadic meteoroids which have been dispersed into a much broader uncollimated distribution of orbits. The sporadic meteors dominate the meteoroid flux at Earth in the size range of those particles of the most of the risk to spacecraft (approximately 100 microns to 1 cm). We describe the results of numerical simulations of the sporadic meteoroid complex by full physical modeling of meteoroids from ejection from their parent body through their perturbation by planets and radiation forces though the end of their lives through collision or ejection from the solar system. This model together with comparison with optical and radar measurements of meteoroid fluxes in near Earth space will allow improved assessment of the risk to spacecraft in near-Earth space from the sporadic complex.

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