The Origin of Our First Interstellar Visitor

On October 19th this year astronomers spotted an object moving rapidly away from the sun. The discovery was made by Pan-STARRS - the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System: a group of telescopes that constantly monitor the sky for moving or variable objects like asteroids or comets, It was initially thought to be a new comet, but after 34 days of follow up observations and a bit of orbital mechanics, it became abundantly clear that we were looking at the first object ever observed that came from outside our solar system. The mysterious object has been dubbed 1I: the first object in a brand new International Astronomical Union class, with “I” standing for “interstellar”. 1I also scored a more poetic name: 'Oumuamua, from the Hawaiian meaning “a messenger from afar arriving fast”.