Space agency breaks silence on 'foreign' interstellar object spotted soaring past Mars

The European Space Agency has commented on the comet that is heading towards Earth which has been causing quite the stir.

Space is a pretty vast place, obviously, but every now and again, researchers discover something that captures their curiosity.

Earlier this year, the NASA-funded ATLAS survey telescope in Chile confirmed that a foreign interstellar object was in fact a comet that was heading towards the planet.

In July, it was identified as 3I/ATLAS, and scientists were able to confirm it is only the third known object to originate from interstellar space, ultimately beyond our own solar system.

The first two were Oumuamua in 2017 and Borisov in 2019.

Interestingly, the way the comet has been ‘behaving’ has left experts and amateurs with a slew of questions. It's traveling too fast to be bound by the Sun's gravity, at more than 41 miles per second, and the anomaly was previously described as ‘possibly hostile’

But how could an icy space rock be ‘hostile’ ? Well, some have argued that it could actually be artificial in nature, yup, that means aliens.

There have been fears the comet is actually alien in nature (Stock Image)

Harvard physicist Avi Loeb has admitted to having concerns and beliefs the ‘comet’ could be something more.

He said: “I believe that we need an international organization that will make policy decisions about such an object.

“We are worried about existential threats from artificial intelligence, from global climate change, from an asteroid impact, but we never discuss alien technology.”

The European Space Agency (ESA) has recently commented on the celestial object after attempting to take images of it as it passed by Mars between October 1 and October 7.

The ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter, jointly operated by ESA and Russia’s Federal Space Agency, intended to take images of Mars, turned its telescopes to the comet. During this time, it was an estimated 18.6 million miles away from the spacecraft.

The European Space Agency shared this diagram depicting the trajectory of the comet (ESA)

Nick Thomas, principal investigator for the spacecraft’s imaging system, said: “This was a very challenging observation for the instrument.

“The comet is around 10,000 to 100,000 times fainter than our usual target.”

THE ESA also took to social media while the comet was passing Mars to comment about their observations.

In a Twitter post, they added: “All eyes on #3I/ATLAS ☄️

“Our Mars Express & ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter will observe the comet around its closest approach to Mars on 3 October 2025, when 3I/ATLAS will be around 30 million km from the red planet. Stay tuned and follow http://esa.int/3IATLAS.”

However, despite fears that the comet could pose a risk or any talks of alien involvement, space agencies, including NASA, are confident it is simply a comet.

They are also confident it will pass closest by our Sun around Halloween before continuing into deep space 'never to be seen again’ and do not believe it poses a threat.

They also estimate it will remain roughly 170 million miles away from Earth during its flyby.