A comet going 130,000 mph is visiting our photo voltaic system from one other star. The Hubble telescope simply took its image.

The Hubble Space Telescope has captured one of the best image but of a high-speed comet visiting our photo voltaic system from one other star.

NASA and the European Space Agency launched the most recent photographs Thursday.

Discovered final month by a telescope in Chile, the comet often known as 3I-Atlas is barely the third identified interstellar object to go our means and poses no menace to Earth.

Astronomers initially estimated the scale of its icy core at a number of miles throughout, however Hubble’s observations have narrowed it right down to not more than 3.5 miles. It might even be as small as 1,000 ft, scientists say, in line with a new paper printed within the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The comet is hurtling our means at 130,000 mph, however will veer nearer to Mars than Earth, retaining a protected distance from each. It was 277 million miles away when photographed by Hubble a pair weeks in the past. The orbiting telescope revealed a teardrop-shaped plume of mud across the nucleus in addition to traces of a dusty tail.

NASA beforehand stated the comet will make its closest method to the solar in late October, scooting between the orbits of Mars and Earth. The company stated 3I/ATLAS ought to stay seen to telescopes by September, however then it should go too near the solar to look at. It is predicted to reappear on the opposite facet of the solar by early December, permitting for renewed observations.

According to Las Cumbres Observatory in Chile, the thing is called “3I” as a result of it’s the third such interstellar object to be discovered, following  1I/’Oumuamu in 2017 and 2I/Borisov in 2019. 

“All three appear to be quite dark and red, reflecting only about 5% of the sunlight that hits them, which is similar in reflectivity to asphalt,” the observatory stated final month. “Unlike 1I/’Oumuamu, 3I does not change much in brightness as it rotates, indicating that it is more likely to be spherical.”

Los Cumbres Observatory created an animation of picture knowledge from its telescope because it tracked the brand new interstellar on July 4 2025: