Scientists Theorize Interstellar Object Oumuamua Could be Extraterrestrial Solar Sail

a reply to: jeep3r

Very Cool OP!

Interesting stuff to contemplate.

S&F.

originally posted by: ABNARTY
a reply to: jeep3r

Great job! Thanks for posting. Unfortunately I have nothing to add to the debate regarding this object.

On a side not, as some other poster has noted a "rock" would make a great spy drone. Or any type of space ship for that matter. Something I have always pondered.

They are readily available - more or less. They can be cored out and built to suit. The mass of the rock on the outside shields from radiation. No need for force fields when the Klingon's attack, the mass of the rock can absorb a ton of energy. Easier to hide from the Empire too.

Kinetic weapons might easily destroy a rock. Maybe something like a space rock pushed into the path or a barrage of nuclear missiles could make a dent.

Whatever sells well I guess. Or what people gladly gobble up.

Oumuamua, looks like another version of the Doomsday Machine from Star Trek.

originally posted by: talisman
Oumuamua, looks like another version of the Doomsday Machine from Star Trek.

If it was really a berserker, then it would already be eating our sun and planets and spitting out copies of itself.

originally posted by: Archivalist
Broken chunk of Dyson grid has been my suggestion for an Oumuamua origin, since it was detected.

It made me do some serious research into events like the Nuremberg 1561 event, as possible debris fields from a Dyson object.
( I think 1561 was just planet/star/orbital misidentifications. I used a sky, field of view simulator to see the sky area mentioned for the date and time of the Nuremberg event. )

Several planets all came up, nearly lined up with the sun, that morning in Nuremberg.

Sad to come to non-alien conclusions, but reasonable to do so.

Oumuamua could still be either I guess. I coin flip artificial vs not, for Oumuamua.

No lies, you'd be brilliant on the bridge in star trek 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻😁

a reply to: Justoneman

I guess it would depend on the size of the rock you decide to make your spaceship

If you pick something a couple of miles across, that is a lot of mass. Most objects would smash into it and you wouldn't even feel it.

originally posted by: ABNARTY
a reply to: Justoneman

I guess it would depend on the size of the rock you decide to make your spaceship

If you pick something a couple of miles across, that is a lot of mass. Most objects would smash into it and you wouldn't even feel it.

Miles long and miles thick, I think you would be right. Still could use Kinetic bombs that hit at speed. Kinetic potential of the hit is
Kp = 1/2 Mass * Velocity2

Multiplying by Velocity squared means V has the potential to deliver a lot of the bang for the "Kp =" needed. One half Mass means there has to be some and as mass gets closer to 0 Mass the potential is Zero! Math is cool.

All very interesting, but the fact is, we were not in a position to intercept it. Not that we could not have been prepared, but we were not. So it's kind of a moot point. Opportunity lost. Now we will never know.

In other news , scientists postulate the "Oumuamua" anomaly may well have been a giant space rat dropping
Film at 11

Well everybody knows that there is lots of gas stuff in space, that shiny bright thing in the sky for one I hear some people say that it is made of some sort of gas.

And so its quite obvious that this funky named dot, they seen on there radar, is probably propelled by some sort of swamp gas. Which gives credence to the theory that there are swamps made of gas in space.

Once again nothing to see here folks. Quite literally.

Silly theory if it was a solar sale on the way in they would have seen it slow down. This is rule one for alien craft had you seen that we would have had 100 percent proof of aliens.

a reply to: Phage

That is interesting as a notion. The idea that the light sail would respond to solar winds with acceleration while moving sunward, is confounding, unless you lay out clearly, the way you believe the sail would operate. Now, it is perfectly possible that my understanding of the concept is flawed, but I had thought that a solar sail, or light sail, would operate in a similar fashion to a sail designed to capture wind in an atmosphere, except that of course, it is the pressure of solar emissions against the sail that provide motive force. In that instance, would it not make more sense for the object to have DECELERATED if it was, indeed, a solar sail, when inbound toward the sun?

I only assume this, because when the wind on Earth is blowing directly opposite to the direction of travel of a sailboat, the sail is counter productive to the forward progress of the vessel. If the wind is blowing at some sort of an angle, the sails can be manipulated to provide forward motion, but only because they act in unison with the keel in the water, somehow levering the vessel forward, despite the fact that the wind is not actually blowing into the rear quarters of the vessel. But in space, there is no keel force acting on a medium which could replicate that half of the terrestrial example. Therefore, you would expect that a structure performing the same task as a sail, would slow the vessel or object down, as it approached the sun, and the pressure of the solar emissions increased, which, as I understand it, did not happen.

Would this mean that the sail was deployed only once the object had passed the sun itself, and could benefit from the pressure of the solar wind in order to boost its outbound speed? I find the idea that a solar sail would INCREASE the sunward speed quite odd. I could understand it if the outer skin of the object were capable of having its sail like qualities suppressed, instead conforming during the sunward approach, into a format more like a solar panel, collecting energy to be deployed in some manner to speed ever faster sunward, with the assistance of the gravity well of the sun of course, but the notion that in sail mode, a thing would speed up as it got closer to the sun simply baffles me.

Could you be a little more explicit in terms of how you think that would work? I would very much appreciate to have insight into the working of your mind on this issue.

Scientists Theorize Interstellar Object Oumuamua Could be Extraterrestrial Solar Sail

When rocks fly!

LOL.

Good grief people.

a reply to: schuyler

Actually I read someplace that if the SpaceX BFR was ready by 2021 or 22, that it actually could catch up to it in like 2029 or something like that. It has enough power, on paper, to overtake it. Don't quote me on the dates, but it was something like an 8 or 9 year journey to catch up.

I think it would be so cool if SpaceX set their mind to using it as one of the test flights. Just put a few cameras, and rudimentary instruments on it. Pictures should settle it once and for all.

Damn Zentraedi..... Always looking for a fight.

I blame the Robotech Masters.....

a reply to: TrueBrit

In that instance, would it not make more sense for the object to have DECELERATED if it was, indeed, a solar sail, when inbound toward the sun?

Acceleration is defined as a change in velocity. That can be slowing down, speeding up, changing direction, or any combination thereof. This is what confused people when the news of Oumuamua's acceleration first hit the internet. Many people thought that meant that the object was speeding up as it left the Solar System. It didn't. It just didn't slow down (which the term acceleration applies to) as much as it should have had only gravity been acting upon it.


BTW, there is some difference between a light sail and a solar sail (also referred to as an electric sail because it would utilize the ions of the solar wind rather than photons).

I was a Boy Scout. Got Boy's Life. I read this issue:
bookzone.boyslife.org...

originally posted by: Blue Shift
I'm still not clear as to where the "sail" part is supposed to be. Wouldn't that be really big?




Getting on towards the size of the moon's disc, and the controlling shrouds would ad some weight too.

a reply to: Phage

Ah, I see.

Terminology buggering up the workings again! That makes a damned sight more sense!

Also, thank you very much for linking me to that story, for I am sure I would never have read it if you hadn't, even being as much of a fool for anything Arthur C. Clarke as I am! I enjoyed reading it

originally posted by: Phage
A light sail would demonstrate a similar acceleration on the sunward (inbound) part of its trajectory, wouldn't it?

The authors do not seem to address that.

My thoughts also. And what a peculiar shape for a light sail no?