Since the observed composition of the comet is mentioned as being "remarkably" similar to solar system comets isn't there any possibility at all that it could indeed be from within our system? Can no combination of freak gravitational nudges/slingshots, however unlikely, result in the observed orbit?
> An artificial satellite also crosses the field of view
Can anyone give some hints on how to spot it? Maye it is really evident, but I was not able to identify it.
I am interested in the fact that an amateur astronomer discovered this and have some subject matter questions. What type/size of telescope would be required? Is this the result of simply arbitrarily scanning night skies? Do amateurs use software of some sort to aide in locating sky locations where undiscovered objects might be? When you do think you’ve found something how do you report it? Do amateur astronomers gravitate toward any one social site, i.e. is there a vibrant Twitter community or subreddit? Was/would Gennedy (and amateurs like her) working in coordination with a group of others (local or distributed).
TLDR I want to discover a space object. How do I do this?
This is so cool!
I love seeing the influence of amateur astronomers, like in this case.
This is quite serious. Interstellar objects travel at very fast speed. Comets, because of their highly elliptical orbit, already impact earth at much higher speeds than asteroids. Can only imagine what a hit from something further than the Oort Cloud is.
It is very likely that the global flood monomyth is based on the impact of a comet around 13,000 years ago. This was somewhat discounted only 10 years ago, but now is more than the majority consensus in the field (“Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis”).
Comet would have hit Greenland by the way, with many pieces falling apart and hitting North America. This would have destabilized the entire ice shield across that area.
This might be a dumb question but how does a comet reach 110,000mph? From an explosion + slingshotting off gravity?
Does this mean we will only see one pass of this comet? Or did/will it get captured?
While Oumuamua was a sentry buoy this ‘comet’ is a confirmation device shielded as ‘interstellar comet’. I wonder who shows up next? This sectors silicon based AI wiping out carbon life forms? Just kidding... hopefully we get to see more of these interstellar objects in the next few years. Exciting!
Is this one less weird (interesting, unique, etc.) than Oumuamua?
I hope we can get spectroscopy done on the tail! It would give us a really unprecedented look into the material composition of other solar systems.