An image of 3I/Atlas has been released taken by the Two-meter Twin Telescope located in Tenerife, Spain , the image was captured on on August 2, 2025 and shows the Sunward pointing jet
![[Image: 1*mtfY0AchznOjUHtnWx-69g.png]](https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fit:1100/format:webp/1*mtfY0AchznOjUHtnWx-69g.png)
We still eagerly await the release of images captured by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter during the flyby of Mars by 3I/Atlas last month , is that just because of the government shutdown or because of what they saw ? , time will tell.
Quote:An image of the interstellar object 3I/ATLAS from the Two-meter Twin Telescope in the Canary Islands, Spain. The image, composed of 159 exposures of 50 seconds each, was taken on August 2, 2025.
It shows a faint jet pointed towards the Sun (marked by a purple line), extending out to a projected distance of about 6,000 kilometers from the nucleus (indicated by the crossing point of the thin red lines). The direction away from the Sun (where a generic cometary tail should have pointed), is shown in yellow. (Credit: M. Serra-Ricart et al., October 15, 2025)
Quote:As soon as the Hubble image was publicized, comet experts cheered that 3I/ATLAS behaves as a comet. But their enthusiasm neglected the fact that the image revealed an anti-tail pointing towards the Sun. Realizing this is as shocking as photographing an animal in your backyard which your family members identify as a common street cat, while the image shows a tail coming out of the animal’s forehead. The only attempt to explain this unique quality of 3I/ATLAS was made in the paper I wrote with Eric Keto (accessible here).
https://avi-loeb.medium.com/a-sunward-je...7ba1808ed2
We still eagerly await the release of images captured by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter during the flyby of Mars by 3I/Atlas last month , is that just because of the government shutdown or because of what they saw ? , time will tell.