Adam Hibberd Have you noticed, 3I/ATLAS is well and truly on its way out of the Solar System? It has afterall passed through its closest approach to the Sun (perihelion) and is well on its way to a close encounter with Jupiter in mid-March – given this, it would seem to be the ideal moment […]
Blog
Members Newsletter – December
Intercepting Interstellar Objects A recent paper by Colin Snodgrass (University of Edinburgh, UK) et al (https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.00492) describes how the ESA Comet Interceptor mission, which is due to launch in 2028/29 to a yet-to-be-discovered target, can provide a conceptual basis for a future mission to visit an Interstellar Object. Comet Interceptor will wait in space until […]
The SpaceX Starship and Catching an Interstellar Object
Adam Hibberd On the request of a colleague, I have solved the problem of exploiting the powerful SpaceX Starship (in fact the yet to be launched Block 3 variant) to lift a spacecraft so that it can catch up with 1I/’Oumuamua, the now rapidly receding ‘interstellar object’. This object sped through the inner group of […]
Members Newsletter – November
News from i4isThe AGM of the Initiative for Interstellar Studies will be held virtually at 14:00 GMT on Saturday 13th December 2025 via Zoom, followed by a virtual social event. Please email andreas.hein@i4is.org if you wish to attend. Estimating The Number of Intelligent Extraterrestrial CivilizationsHristo Delev (MPHAC “Uni Hospital”, Bulgaria) and Todorka L. Dimitrova (University […]
Principium 51
Principium 51 has gone out to subscribers and is now accessible to all.
3I/ATLAS in Plane Language.
Adam Hibberd I have had many queries concerning the calculation of the likelihood of 3I/ATLAS’s orbital plane lying within 5° of that of the ecliptic of the Solar System. This calculation appears in the paper ‘Is the Interstellar Object 3I/ATLAS Alien Technology?’ which can be found here. The calculation exploits a simple equation based on […]
Elon’s Starship to Launch Project Lyra?
Adam Hibberd Yesterday I was trying to gauge the measure of the SpaceX Starship in terms of its ability to launch the Project Lyra spacecraft on its way to its destination. BTW Project Lyra is the initiative to send a mission to catch-up with very quickly receding interstellar object 1I/’Oumuamua. So exactly how do we […]
3I/ATLAS Mission to Launch in 2035
Adam Hibberd As a consequence of exploring the Solar Oberth option to catch up with 3I/ATLAS, using my software development Optimum Interplanetary Trajectory Software (OITS), I have discovered that a mission exists IN THE FUTURE, with a launch in 10 years time, i.e. in 2035. The video animation can be found on my YouTube channel […]