The Hubble Space Telescope has once again observed the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS, a visitor that continues to traverse the solar system before departing permanently. This object, first detected in July, is being closely monitored due to its origin outside our cosmic neighborhood.
3I/ATLAS attracted attention when it was confirmed to be only the third body originating from another star system. According to NASA, at the time of its discovery, it was traveling at approximately 137,000 miles per hour (220,480 km/h). Its trajectory and speed demonstrated that it did not form around the Sun but was ejected from another region of the Milky Way, spending billions of years drifting through interstellar space before reaching our solar system.
The most recent observation by Hubble occurred on November 30, when the comet was located about 178 million miles from Earth. As the telescope tracked the object’s movement, the background stars appeared as streaks rather than points, the agency explained.
The comet was also observed by the European Space Agency’s Juice mission, a spacecraft currently en route to Jupiter. Between November 2 and 25, the orbiter recorded the comet during a period of high activity following its recent approach to the Sun. Although the majority of the data will not arrive until February, the team was able to download part of an image taken on November 2, which distinguishes its luminous coma and two distinct tails: one of charged gas and another of dust.
On November 19, NASA released a new series of previously unseen photographs revealing additional aspects of the object. According to the agency, 3I/ATLAS will pass within approximately 170 million miles of Earth on December 19, a completely safe distance.
The object will not be visible to the naked eye, but anyone with a small telescope will be able to spot it in the pre-dawn sky through the spring of 2026. The tool “Eyes on the Solar System” allows users to track its location in real-time.
As is known, the presence of this celestial body also sparked various theories, such as the idea that it could be an extraterrestrial spacecraft. Astrophysicist Avi Loeb raised this possibility, although he clarified in his blog on Medium that the object is “most likely a comet of natural origin.”
However, he did not completely rule out the possibility that it could be a structure of artificial origin.
NASA, for its part, denied these speculations. “There are no aliens. There is no threat to life here on Earth,” said Sean Duffy, the agency’s acting administrator.
Nicola Fox, Associate Administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, also rejected this theory during a November conference: “We certainly haven’t seen any technosignatures or anything that would lead us to think it is anything other than a comet.”
This article was translated from Spanish by a Depor editor with the help of a generative artificial intelligence tool
