Pic of the Day

Artist's impression of Oumuamua

The space jocks are pretty sure it is just passing through our neighborhood and is not in orbit around the sun.  It's estimated to be 400 meters long, which is pretty freakin' small. Makes me wonder how it was defected in the first place. Probably by a computer program that noticed one pixel was not the same as the ones in previous photos.

They also tacked a funny accent mark on the front of the name. Like that's going to make a difference in how people pronounce it. Well, it makes no difference to me. Besides, I am unlikely speak its name, and if I do, who will know if I am saying it wrong? Certainly not me.

A little more pointing and clicking turned up this video.


Animation of `Oumuamua passing through the Solar System
The trajectory of this thing reminds me of nothing so much as Arthur C. Clarke's Rendezvous with Rama. It could be just a coincidence that it came so close to our Sun, but if you want to believe in aliens, it sure looks like it was aimed there with the intent of altering its trajectory. Where is Flash Gordon when we need him? Well, it doesn't matter because we couldn't have caught it if we wanted to. It's traveling at over 20 miles per second. The only spacecraft that have ever gotten up to that speed are interplanetary probes that we sent sunward, like Cassini.

Via Indy Tom

Update January 2018 replaced missing video.