Solar System’s First Interstellar Visitor Dazzles Scientists

Started by Unbeliever, December 22, 2017, 06:03:18 PM

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Unbeliever

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/solar-system-s-first-interstellar-visitor-dazzles-scientists


QuoteAstronomers recently scrambled to observe an intriguing asteroid that zipped through the solar system on a steep trajectory from interstellar spaceâ€"the first confirmed object from another star.
Now, new data reveal the interstellar interloper to be a rocky, cigar-shaped object with a somewhat reddish hue. The asteroid, named ‘Oumuamua by its discoverers, is up to one-quarter mile (400 meters) long and highly-elongatedâ€"perhaps 10 times as long as it is wide. That aspect ratio is greater than that of any asteroid or comet observed in our solar system to date. While its elongated shape is quite surprising, and unlike asteroids seen in our solar system, it may provide new clues into how other solar systems formed.








This could be of some real interest. I hope they can get a mission quickly enough to go study it up close.




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYGs92-qnFY
God Not Found
"There is a sucker born-again every minute." - C. Spellman

Baruch

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and sometimes it is an interstellar asteroid ;-)
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

Cavebear

Not the usual shape, therefore obviously an alien structure.  (koff, koff).

Run for it!
Atheist born, atheist bred.  And when I die, atheist dead!

Unbeliever

I keep hearing that it's never aliens, but sooner or later it may be - what better way to   travel incognito?
God Not Found
"There is a sucker born-again every minute." - C. Spellman

Shiranu

Shame we likely won't be able to do anything with it, with the state NASA and the fed. govt is atm. Maybe the EU or India or China can step up and send something it's way.
"A little science distances you from God, but a lot of science brings you nearer to Him." - Louis Pasteur

PopeyesPappy

Quote from: Shiranu on December 23, 2017, 10:51:39 PM
Shame we likely won't be able to do anything with it, with the state NASA and the fed. govt is atm. Maybe the EU or India or China can step up and send something it's way.

The state of NASA aside, no country or agency on Earth currently has the technology to send any type of probe to the general vicinity of this object. It was already moving away from the sun, and moving to fast for us to catch up with it by the time it was first discovered. The launch for such an intercept would have to have taken place months if not years in advance.
Save a life. Adopt a Greyhound.

SGOS

I'm disappointed in the thread.  There could have been hundreds of dirty jokes about this thingy, and no one came up with anything.









Gawdzilla Sama

Four billion years the planet's been around. I suspect this thing isn't our first such visitor.
We 'new atheists' have a reputation for being militant, but make no mistake  we didn't start this war. If you want to place blame put it on the the religious zealots who have been poisoning the minds of the  young for a long long time."
PZ Myers

SGOS

There's a lot of stuff floating around out there, and it clobbers the stuffing out of the solar system.  All those craters on the moon should suggest something about our tenuous situation.  Perhaps the real miracle is not that there is life on our planet, but that life hasn't been wiped out yet.

Baruch

Quote from: SGOS on December 25, 2017, 01:56:32 PM
I'm disappointed in the thread.  There could have been hundreds of dirty jokes about this thingy, and no one came up with anything.

President Clinton knew what to do with a cigar ... I suspect Freud did to, or he wouldn't have commented on it (I was quoting Freud).
Ha’át’íísh baa naniná?
Azee’ Å,a’ish nanídį́į́h?
Táadoo ánít’iní.
What are you doing?
Are you taking any medications?
Don't do that.

Gawdzilla Sama

Quote from: SGOS on December 25, 2017, 07:37:46 PM
There's a lot of stuff floating around out there, and it clobbers the stuffing out of the solar system.  All those craters on the moon should suggest something about our tenuous situation.  Perhaps the real miracle is not that there is life on our planet, but that life hasn't been wiped out yet.
The worst of that came from local junk and pretty got cleared out during the Late Heavy Bombardment.
We 'new atheists' have a reputation for being militant, but make no mistake  we didn't start this war. If you want to place blame put it on the the religious zealots who have been poisoning the minds of the  young for a long long time."
PZ Myers

PopeyesPappy

Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on December 25, 2017, 07:21:54 PM
Four billion years the planet's been around. I suspect this thing isn't our first such visitor.

One article I read about this thing, could have been the one in the OP, said they estimate we get at least one such visitor a year. This is just the first one that's been positively identified as coming from somewhere else due to its orbit.
Save a life. Adopt a Greyhound.

Cavebear

Quote from: SGOS on December 25, 2017, 01:56:32 PM
I'm disappointed in the thread.  There could have been hundreds of dirty jokes about this thingy, and no one came up with anything.

"The internal system was penetrated and we didn't even get mildly excited before it was gone"?
Atheist born, atheist bred.  And when I die, atheist dead!

SGOS

Quote from: Cavebear on December 26, 2017, 04:30:25 AM
"The internal system was penetrated and we didn't even get mildly excited before it was gone"?
Thanks.  That helps.

Cavebear

Atheist born, atheist bred.  And when I die, atheist dead!