Luna dispatched a strongly-worded letter to NASA's Acting Administrator Sean Duffy on 31 October, demanding the immediate release of these images. The photographs in question were captured by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter when this mysterious space rock, designated 3I/ATLAS, passed by Mars at the beginning of October.
NASA attributes the delay to the government shutdown that commenced on 1 October. That might seem reasonable enough. Yet here's where matters become rather curious: the European Space Agency and other observatories have been steadily releasing their 3I/ATLAS observations without any apparent difficulty. It does raise questions.
"This information is of great importance to advancing our understanding of interstellar visitors and their interaction with our solar system"
Luna wrote in her letter to Duffy, following up with a notably direct public tweet:
"We would like to see images of 3IATLAS."
No diplomatic niceties there.
To understand the significance of this situation, some context is essential. 3I/ATLAS represents only the third confirmed visitor from outside our solar system ever detected. The first was 'Oumuamua in 2017 (that peculiar cigar-shaped object that caused quite a stir), followed by comet Borisov in 2019, and now this remarkable specimen.
Discovered on 1 July by a NASA-funded telescope in Chile, 3I/ATLAS has been exhibiting some rather unusual characteristics. Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb's analysis of this object reveals genuinely fascinating anomalies. The comet is displaying behaviours that conventional comets typically don't exhibit.
Most notably, it expelled a jet of material towards the Sun—completely backwards from expected comet behaviour. Its chemical composition is equally puzzling: extraordinarily high carbon dioxide levels compared to water, plus an unusual abundance of nickel. Perhaps most intriguingly, its trajectory aligns almost perfectly with the origin point of the famous "Wow!" radio signal from 1977. Coincidence? Possibly. But it's certainly worth noting.
Luna's demands extend well beyond just the Mars photographs. She's urging NASA to deploy all available resources to study this object, including the Juno spacecraft currently orbiting Jupiter, which could potentially observe 3I/ATLAS when it passes nearby in March 2026. She's also requesting data from the Parker Solar Probe and seeking clarification about questionable database entries regarding a 2014 interstellar meteor that crashed near Papua New Guinea.
This forms part of Luna's broader campaign for transparency, particularly regarding UAP disclosure and government accountability. She's been conducting hearings, protecting whistleblowers, and generally making things rather uncomfortable for those attempting to maintain secrecy around anomalous phenomena. Notably, she's garnered bipartisan support, with figures like JD Vance pledging transparency on UAP matters.
To be clear, most scientists believe 3I/ATLAS is simply an extraordinarily old comet. And by old, we're talking genuinely ancient—possibly 14 billion years old. That predates our Sun, Earth, and virtually everything in our solar neighbourhood.
Nevertheless, the question persists: why the delay with the photographs? The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter carries some of the most sophisticated cameras humanity has ever sent to space. Whatever it observed would have been captured in exceptional detail. Sources inform DefenseScoop that NASA finally briefed Luna's team on 6 November and promised to release everything once government operations fully resume. Time will tell.
The James Webb Space Telescope has already provided some rather puzzling data about this visitor. That CO2-to-water ratio mentioned earlier? It's among the highest ever recorded in a comet, particularly unusual given its distance from the Sun when measured. The nucleus is massive as well—potentially 3.5 miles across. That's enormous compared to previous interstellar visitors.
Some researchers, Loeb among them, suggest it's worth considering the possibility that this object isn't entirely natural. This isn't about jumping to conclusions or crying "aliens" from the rooftops. Rather, when something this unusual arrives from another star system, it merits examining all possibilities, however unlikely they might seem.
What's particularly noteworthy about Luna's approach is how she's positioned this within a much larger context. Senators Marco Rubio and Kirsten Gillibrand have been vocal about government transparency for some time. Gillibrand has expressed particular frustration about what she terms "secret parts of government that no one ever sees." It's an understandable concern.
Luna has been strategic in her approach. She's enlisted respected scientists like Loeb, utilised social media to generate public pressure, and connected this to broader concerns about government accountability. With recent shifts in the political landscape, there's a growing sense that the traditional gatekeepers of such information might finally be losing their grip.
Setting aside speculation for a moment, this represents an extraordinary scientific opportunity. This is material from another star system, potentially billions of years older than anything in our solar system. It's comparable to discovering a fossil from before life on Earth even existed.
The International Asteroid Warning Network has mobilised observatories worldwide to study this object. However, those NASA images from Mars remain crucial. They would provide the most precise data yet on its size, structure, and potentially composition. As Loeb notes, they represent "our most precise constraint on the object's size to date."
The critical factor here is time. 3I/ATLAS won't remain in our vicinity indefinitely. It's already beginning its journey back to interstellar space. Once it departs, it's gone permanently. No second opportunities. This urgency undoubtedly drives Luna's persistent pressure on NASA. Every day of delay means less time to study this extraordinary visitor.
The 3I/ATLAS situation appears to be something of a test case. If Congress can compel NASA to release photographs of a comet, what other information might they successfully extract? The UAP community is certainly observing with keen interest. With significant disclosure events on the horizon promising new revelations, success here could establish an important precedent.
NASA will likely release the images eventually. They may well show perfectly ordinary comet photographs—a large, dirty snowball tumbling through space. Then again, given this particular visitor's unusual characteristics, perhaps not. The prolonged delay, whilst other agencies continue their releases, certainly invites speculation.
Whatever those images ultimately reveal, Luna has ensured the public will see them. And that's rather the point, isn't it? Whether 3I/ATLAS proves to be an ancient comet or something more exotic, the public deserves transparency about what's traversing our cosmic neighbourhood. Particularly when it's travelled such an extraordinary distance to visit.
