Featured Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
It's a Bird... It's a Plane... It's... well, none of us actually know. As we look to the stars and learn more about space, the conspiracy theories continue to swirl.
We might not have been back to the Moon since 1972, but that hasn't stopped NASA from exploring the cosmos.
Alongside wild claims that we found life on Mars and killed it 50 years ago, there's the idea that the Big Bang is a mirror to a different universe, and people are still obsessed with what could be hiding at Area 51.
With Elon Musk trying to colonize Mars and SpaceX continuing to dominate the exploration industry as Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin focuses on tourism, the vast expanse of space is getting ever so slightly smaller.
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There are ever-present fears that alien lifeforms could come to Earth and wipe us out, with the discovery of the mysterious 3I/ATLAS object doing nothing to quell them.
First spotted on July 1, 3I/ATLAS is hurtling toward Earth at 209,000 km/h and is being considered by some as a 'hostile alien threat' as it becomes the fastest interstellar object ever observed.
NASA has now seemingly released the first picture of 31/ATLAS, and while we still don't know what the mysterious object actually is, it's sent conspiracy theories into overdrive.
The shot was apparently captured by NASA's Mars Perseverance rover and has gone viral on social media. We can see what looks like a cylindrical object that's flying through the Martian sky with a bright light.
As you can imagine, it wasn't long before the comments were flooded with some pretty out-there claims, with some stating it's an 'alien mothership'.
Still, experts like Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb suggest the unusual shape of the object is due to how the image was captured. NDTV claims the shot was captured on October 3, with 3I/ATLAS measuring around 46km in diameter and rocketing along at a jaw-dropping 60 km/sec.
While the European Space Agency has reported on the find, NASA has yet to clarify that this is 3I/ATLAS.
Over on X, the theorists were out in full force, with one person writing: "1. It’s not a comet. 2. It’s where the wow sound originated from in 1977. 3. It is on a very precisely calculated purposeful trajectory. 4. We will not be the same once it passes."
Another added: "Definitely cigar shaped like many UAP sightings 👀."
A third said: "What a timing they are coming when we are on the verge of WW3."
Someone even asked Grok whether it's the real deal, with Elon Musk's sassy AI concluding: "The photos of 3I/ATLAS from Perseverance show an elongated, blurry streak likely due to its high speed (137,000 mph) causing motion blur in exposures. The 29 million km distance also limits detail. Spinning might add to the odd shape if rotating fast, per initial analyses."
Whatever 3I/ATLAS is, astronomers believe it has come from the edge of the galaxy and could be billions of years older than our Sun. Alongside Oumuamua and Borisov, it's only the third interstellar object detected and will make its closest pass to the Sun on October 30.
