  We investigated the probability that an inelastic collision of planetesimals
within the Hill sphere of the Jovian planets could explain the presence and
orbits of observed irregular satellites. Capture of satellites via this
mechanism is highly dependent on not only the mass of the protoplanetary disk,
but also the shape of the planetesimal size distribution. We performed 2000
simulations for integrated time intervals $\sim 2$ Myr and found that, given
the currently accepted value for the minimum mass solar nebula and planetesimal
number density based upon the \citet{Nesvorny2003} and \citet{Charnoz2003} size
distribution $dN \sim D^{-3.5} dD$, the collision rates for the different
Jovian planets range between $\sim 0.6$ and $\gtrsim 170 \, \Myr^{-1}$ for
objects with radii, $1 \, \km \le r \le 10 \, \km$. Additionally, we found that
the probability that these collisions remove enough orbital energy to yield a
bound orbit was $\lesssim 10^{-5}$ and had very little dependence on the
relative size of the planetesimals. Of these collisions, the collision energy
between two objects was $\gtrsim 10^3$ times the gravitational binding energy
for objects with radii $\sim 100$ km. We find that, capturing irregular
satellites via collisions between unbound objects can only account for $\sim
0.1%$ of the observed population, hence can this not be the sole method of
producing irregular satellites.
