In the fresh images of 3I/ATLAS taken from the Nordic Optical Telescope at La Palma in the Canary Islands on November 11, 2025, the interstellar interloper shows no evidence of breakup since its perihelion on October 29. In his blog, Professor Avi Loeb notes
The prominent elongation in the glow surrounding 3I/ATLAS projects to a position angle of 106 (+/-10) degrees. This is close to the projected sunward direction of 115 degrees. It resembles the image obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope on July 21, 2025, which showed an anti-tail pointing towards the Sun.
He further states
Given the large-scale jets reported recently, the fact that 3I/ATLAS remains a single body is surprising for a natural comet.
Professor Loeb further notes that the observations of interstellar object 3I/ATLAS on November 9, 2029 revealed jets extending approximately 1 million kilometers sunward and 3 million kilometers in the opposite direction. He calculates that with the expected natural comet outflow velocities of 0.4 km/s, these jets must have persisted for 1-3 months.
He further remarks how the analysis indicates the jets’ mass density at one million kilometers is several million proton masses per cubic centimeter, implying a mass flux of 5 billion tons per month. Sublimating this quantity of CO₂ ice requires 3×10^18 Joules of energy. Given solar energy flux at perihelion, this necessitates an absorbing area exceeding 1,600 square kilometers—equivalent to a 23-kilometer diameter sphere.
He states that
This is four times larger than the Hubble Space Telescope’s maximum observed diameter of 5.6 kilometers for 3I/ATLAS. For water ice, the required diameter would be 51 kilometers. Since natural cometary ice pockets typically cover only a small surface fraction, these calculations are inconsistent with 3I/ATLAS being an intact single body.
So what do we have now? Loeb remarks, invoking Einstein,
This raises a new anomaly of 3I/ATLAS that must be explained by those who wish to shove the anomalies of 3I/ATLAS under the carpet of traditional knowledge on solar system comets rather than consider alternatives.
As Albert Einstein said,
“Knowledge is realizing that the street is one way; wisdom is looking in both directions anyway.”
The 11th anomaly
Technological thrusters that point their exhaust towards the Sun would accelerate away from the Sun. This post-perihelion maneuver might be employed by a spacecraft that aims to gain speed rather than slow down through the gravitational assist from the Sun.
Check the article below for a comprehensive list of the previous 10 anomalies spotted by Prof. Loeb and its breakdown by Jason Wright.
See Also: 3I/ATLAS: Astronomer Jason Wright Demystifies Prof. Avi Loeb’s 10 Anomalies One By One