First Interstellar Asteroid (Oumuamua) Wows Scientists.

Laurie61

Well-Known Forumite
I must admit when I saw this report my first thought was a story by Arthur C. Clarke, Rendezvous with Rama. It is an unusual object but no signs of life. -

Astronomers finally have a name for the first known object from interstellar space to visit our solar system. The International Astronomical Union announced last week that it is to be called 1I/‘Oumuamua

It had already swept through perihelion within 38m km of the Sun on the 9th and 24m km from the Earth on the 14th. The interstellar, cigar shaped, asteroid measures over 400 meters in length and 40 meters wide.

The initial reaction was to name it as the comet C/2017 U1 (PANSTARRS) but it soon became clear that it was no ordinary comet More observation also failed to detect any trace of gas and dust that we expect around every comet, at least while they are in the inner solar system. This led to its re labelling as A/2017 U1, the first time this had been done.

The new object was clearly in a hyperbolic orbit that had brought it from beyond the Oort cloud at a relative speed of 60,000 mph. Having passed the Sun, it is now speeding away in a very different direction, towards the Square of Pegasus, never to return.

It approached the solar system from a direction close to that of Vega in Lyra.

Vega is probably not the parent star since it was elsewhere when ’Oumuamua passed that point about 300,000 years ago. Although there are attempts to trace it back to its origin the chance of success is slim, since It’s home star may be many thousands of light years away, or even on the far side of our Milky Way galaxy.

 
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