For the first time ever, astronomers have observed an object that entered our solar system from the outside and the odd asteroid is quite remarkable.
Spotted by researchers in Hawaii, the weird 'visitor' boasts a strange, elongated shape where the quarter-mile length of the asteroid appears to be around ten times its width.
This is particularly amazing to astronomers who say that the ratio is seven times greater than anything seen in the past.
Although such objects have long been theorized to exist coming into and out of solar system, the newfound asteroid constitutes confirmation of that hypothesis.
Researchers are now scrambling to observe the asteroid since they believe it could provide tremendous insight into the formation of objects around stars other than our sun.
In a nod to the location from which the asteroid was discovered, it was given the name 'Oumuamua, which is Hawaiian for "messenger from afar arriving first."
UFO enthusiasts concerned that perhaps the interstellar object is not an asteroid at all and, in fact, an alien invader can rest easy knowing that 'Oumuamua is already headed away from the Earth and en route to leave our solar system in the next few years.
So either the object really is an asteroid that is simply passing through our solar system or the alien scout ship took one look at Earth and concluded that an invasion really wasn't worth the trouble.
Source: NASA