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The 3I/ATLAS comet has generated curiosity and concern within the scientific community and among astronomy enthusiasts since it was first discovered on July 1, 2025. Recently, the celestial body emerged from its perihelion, which occurred on October 29, with new data regarding its origin and nature, including the fact that it became brighter than the Sun and lost 15 percent of its mass.
Within this context, Elon Musk, the world's richest man, gave his opinion on this celestial body and the claims made by Harvard University-linked expert Avi Loeb, who says it is an alien spacecraft.
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During his appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, the owner of Tesla spoke about the celestial body that has captured media attention in recent months after the host brought up the possibility that it could be extraterrestrial technology.
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Rogan spoke with Elon about its composition—mostly nickel in its gas cloud, which scientists have analyzed as the object travels through space—and noted that if it were a real spacecraft, it would be “a real problem” if it collided with Earth.
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Elon Musk, without confirming that it is an alien ship or debunking the theory, issued his hypothesis regarding the nature of the 3I/ATLAS interstellar body and the damage it would cause to Earth in a possible collision, taking its composition into account.
“There are certainly comets and asteroids that are primarily nickel,” Musk replied to the comment.
“So the places where nickel is mined on Earth are actually sites where an asteroid or comet hit, meaning a nickel-rich meteorite,” Musk explained, referring to the origin of that element on Earth.
When the host asked if there would be a major impact on the planet if 3I/ATLAS were to collide, Musk replied:
“It would be a very heavy spacecraft if it was made entirely of nickel. Yes, it would be a very heavy spacecraft. It would be capable of destroying a continent, or even worse.”
On the podcast, Musk explained extinctions caused by comets or asteroids and the damage left on Earth millions of years ago, noting that the damage of a phenomenon today would depend on the total mass of the celestial body.
“It depends on what the total mass is. The thing is, in the fossil record, there are possibly five major extinctions, the biggest of which is the Permian extinction, where almost all life was wiped out, which actually happened over several million years,” said the billionaire.
“There’s the Jurassic, I think that’s definitely an asteroid, but what they don’t tell you about are the ones that just destroy a continent, because those don’t show up in the fossil record,” he pointed out.
“So unless it is enough to cause a mass extinction event across the entire Earth, it doesn't show up in a 200-million-year-old fossil record. Therefore, there have been many impacts that would have destroyed all life in half of North America or something like that throughout history.”
In response to this explanation and the possibilities of said comet impacting us, Rogan replied: “And there is nothing to be done about it right now.”
The billionaire's comments were only presented as a hypothesis, as NASA and other astronomers who have closely followed the 3I/ATLAS comet state that the object will pass near Earth on December 19 at a distance of 273,588,480 kilometers. Far enough away to avoid a human catastrophe.
[Publicidad]