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  "path": "/2026/02/23/use-a-solar-slingshot-catch-3i-atlas-scientists-say-27063614/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-02-23T13:23:25.000Z",
  "site": "https://metro.co.uk",
  "tags": [
    "News",
    "Tech",
    "Space",
    "3I/ATLAS",
    "was a snowball (a comet) or a UFO",
    "making observations tricky",
    "get a nifty speed boost",
    "new paper",
    "The first was Oumuamua,",
    "Borisov",
    "**check our news page**",
    "Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google Add as preferred source"
  ],
  "textContent": "Is this how we get a closer look of the mysterious 3I/ATLAS comet (Picture: Getty/Metro)\n\nScientists have figured out a way to make one of the fastest spacecraft in the world – using a solar slingshot.\n\nIn the months since **3I/ATLAS** was spotted drifting into our solar system, scientists clashed over whether it was a snowball (a comet) or a UFO.\n\nOne reason for this was that even at its closest to Earth in December, 3I/ATLAS was still 167 million miles away, making observations tricky.\n\nSo, why not just send a spacecraft over there? This is what scientists are thinking could be possible by doing a rather out-there rocker manoeuvre.\n\nA team from the Initiative for Interstellar Studies said we could launch a 500kg probe into space that would use the sun’s gravity like a slingshot.\n\nBut while it’s curving around our star, it would exploit the ‘Oberth effect’ to get a nifty speed boost.\n\nDr Alfredo Carpineti, an astrophysicist who was not involved in the non-profit’s new paper, told **Metro** : ‘As a spacecraft is falling into the gravitational potential well, it fires its rockets, coming out of it with a greater kinetic energy.’\n\nComet 3I/ATLAS was first spotted last July (Picture: International Gemini Observatory)\n\nThe plan would first send the interstellar interceptor to Jupiter to use the gas giant’s gravity to slow it down.\n\nWhile this sounds strange, if the craft launched straight at the sun, it would travel so fast that it would end up being hurled out into space.\n\nAs elaborate as this sounds, Dr Carpineti says this is ‘the most efficient time to burn fuel’.\n\nAchieving this, though, would involve flying just 140,000 miles from the sun’s centre, meaning the craft would need to endure some serious heat.\n\nThe researchers suggest the craft could be clad in a carbon-composite and aerogel, one of the lightest materials in the world.\n\nExperts propose launching the probe in 2035, as it could reach 3I/ATLAS by 2085, when it would be 68 million miles away.\n\nOne thing holding the mission back is that even with the Oberth effect, the craft still wouldn’t be fast enough to get close to entering 3I/ATLAS’ orbit.\n\nDr Carpineti adds: ‘The work doesn’t look at the feasibility of the mission but just the manoeuvre.\n\n‘Indeed, it’s possible to use this approach to catch up with the rocket.\n\n‘But since the interstellar object is so much faster than the previous two, it would take decades.’\n\n3I/ATLAS, formerly known as A11pI3Z, is only the third interstellar visitor to be discovered passing through our neck of the cosmic woods.\n\nThe first was Oumuamua, which travelled past us in 2017. In 2019, Borisov, a comet of interstellar origin, passed by.\n\nLike Borisov, scientists believe 3I/ATLAS likely formed as a comet around another star before being flung out into the cosmos.\n\n******Get in touch with our news team by emailing us atwebnews@metro.co.uk.******\n\n**For more stories like this,****check our news page**.\n\nComment now Comments  Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google Add as preferred source ",
  "title": "Fastest machine ever built to be fired around the sun to chase ‘UFO’ comet"
}