China’s Tianwen-1 Mars probe’s orbiter has successfully observed interstellar object 3I/ATLAS, a comet which is not itself part of the Solar System, but originates from outside, likely from “around ancient stars near the center of the Milky Way, with an estimated age of approximately 3 to 11 billion years—potentially older than the solar system itself,” Global Times reports.
The Tianwen-1 probe entered Mars orbit in February 2021, and has been operating stably ever since, they report. It used its high-resolution camera to “successfully observe the interstellar object 3I/ATLAS from approximately 30 million kilometers away from the target, making it one of the closest detectors to have observed this object to date, the Global Times learned from the China National Space Administration (CNSA) on Thursday,” Nov. 6. They add: “Notwithstanding major disruptions from the U.S. government shutdown, NASA has been monitoring the 3I/ATLAS as it moves through the Solar System, per the DefenseScoop, a U.S. tech news source.”
