Harvard astrophysicist Dr. Avi Loeb warned on Newsmax on Saturday that the Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer-led government shutdown is now obstructing NASA's release of key imagery from a mysterious interstellar object, 3I-Atlas, calling the delay "terrestrial stupidity" rather than evidence of extraterrestrial secrecy.
The Frank B. Baird Jr. Professor of Science at Harvard University Center for Astrophysics, Loeb, appeared on "America Right Now," where he said the latest clash in Washington has now reached into deep space.
Loeb described an unexplained object traveling through the solar system that has stunned scientists with what he called an extremely improbable flight path.
"Its trajectory is aligned with the plane of the planets around the sun, the so-called ecliptic plane," he said. "And the chance of that happening at random is 1 in 500. So the question arises as to whether its trajectory was designed by some intelligence.
"And it's coming very close to several planets, including Mars on October 2nd [in 2025] and then Jupiter on March 16th, 2026. So the question is, is it planning to not only probe these planets, but perhaps even release probes that will visit the Earth? Or maybe it will maneuver when it comes closest to the sun on October 29th."
The Harvard scientist said that while NASA has already released Hubble and Webb imagery, the most critical photo captured by a government craft is now sitting unseen by the public.
"Well, we did see images from the Hubble Space Telescope, from the Webb telescope. So, NASA did release images in the past, but the best image is yet to come," Loeb explained.
"It was obtained on October 2nd, when the object was 30,000,000 kilometers away from Mars, and the high-res[olution] camera on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took the very sharpest image of it with 30 kilometers resolution per pixel.
"And we really want to see that image. However, the claim is that because of the government shutdown, we are not able to see it. And it's already [been] three weeks since the image was taken.
"So I tend to assign this delay with rather than with extraterrestrial intelligence, with terrestrial stupidity. I mean, it's just the government shutdown."
Loeb said the timeline ahead is crucial and fast approaching.
"And a week later, there will be a mission that was launched by the European Space Agency called Juice that will be able to observe it. And then on December 19th, 2025, that's just one week before Christmas, the object will come closest to Earth, and then we should get the best image from Earth of that object," he said.
"Finally, on March 16th, 2026, it will come closest to Mars. And there we have a spacecraft called Juno that hopefully will not only image it, but could use its radio antenna to try and detect maybe a radio signal from it."
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Jim Thomas ✉
Jim Thomas is a writer based in Indiana. He holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science, a law degree from U.I.C. Law School, and has practiced law for more than 20 years.
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