Interstellar Interlopers, Coming in from the great beyond Options

[Holder of the Tw...]

They finally found a chunk of something coming into the Solar System. Something much bigger than cosmic rays or dust particles.

Asteroid/comet in hyperbolic trajectory

[Holder of the Tw...]

The Goldstone radar never really had a chance with this one. 'Oumaumau was probably too small to even be detected at its closest approach. Certainly too small to get anything other than just a basic signal return that would barely pop out of background noise. Arecibo theoretically could have seen it around October 20 when it moved into the extreme southern end of what that telescope could observe, but it would have been a very short window and not much of a signal either, as it was rapidly moving away at that point. In any event, the orbit of 'Oumaumau at that point was too uncertain, and the notice was too short.