Overview
- JUICE’s JANUS camera captured 3I/ATLAS on November 6, 2025 from about 66 million kilometers, revealing a bright coma, a long tail, and hints of jets, rays, streams, and filaments.
- ESA reports the object’s behavior matches that of a normal active comet, and NASA officials have said they see no technosignatures or threat to Earth.
- Data relay was delayed while JUICE used its high‑gain antenna as a heat shield; more than 120 images plus spectrometry, submillimeter, and particle measurements are now under study, with results to be discussed in late March.
- Hubble contributed a broad nucleus size estimate, while NASA’s TESS reobserved the comet January 15–22 to refine activity and rotation, and SPHEREx collected additional infrared observations in December.
- New reporting details a proposed interception mission targeting a 2035 launch to reach the comet by 2085 using a near‑Sun Oberth maneuver, an idea criticized by Avi Loeb as a poor use of resources compared with preparing for future interstellar visitors.