# The 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko observation campaign in support of the Rosetta mission

## TL;DR

This paper summarizes a global observational campaign supporting ESA's Rosetta mission, providing essential data on comet 67P's behavior, composition, and activity patterns to enhance understanding of cometary science.

## Contribution

It presents a comprehensive overview of ground-based and space-based observations of 67P, linking remote sensing data with in situ measurements for the first time.

## Key findings

- 67P is a typical Jupiter family comet with repeatable activity patterns
- Ground-based observations complement in situ data for comprehensive analysis
- The campaign established baseline data for future comet studies

## Abstract

We present a summary of the campaign of remote observations that supported the European Space Agency's Rosetta mission. Telescopes across the globe (and in space) followed comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko from before Rosetta's arrival until nearly the end of mission in September 2016. These provided essential data for mission planning, large-scale context information for the coma and tails beyond the spacecraft, and a way to directly compare 67P with other comets. The observations revealed 67P to be a relatively `well behaved' comet, typical of Jupiter family comets and with activity patterns that repeat from orbit-to-orbit. Comparison between this large collection of telescopic observations and the in situ results from Rosetta will allow us to better understand comet coma chemistry and structure. This work is just beginning as the mission ends -- in this paper we present a summary of the ground-based observations and early results, and point to many questions that will be addressed in future studies.