Since several months now, myself and fellow space / UFO enthusiasts have been following what’s going on with the space object 3I/ATLAS, which does not originate from our Solar System but comes from somewhere beyond it. The majority of scientists have declared it to be a comet, although it has many unusual characteristics. On the contrary, astrophysicist Avi Loeb announced it is quite likely that 3I/ATLAS is in fact an extraterrestrial spacecraft and even warned that we should take our vacation before October 29 — because after that, who knows what might happen.
Why exactly the 29th? Because the perihelion of 3I/ATLAS (its closest approach to the Sun) is around October 29–30, 2025. There is a chance that in an unambiguous way it will be proven this to be an object of artificial origin. The consequences for Earth of such an event are, mildly put, unclear and vary widely.
According to some, most earth-dwellers won’t be impressed by the news that we’re not alone in the Universe and will carry on with life as usual.
According to others, the chaos that will follow will be similar to that caused by the radio broadcast “War of the Worlds”. Religions will collapse, the fragile economic system will crash, riots will start. The chaos will be even greater if not only the existence of extraterrestrials is confirmed, but 3I/ATLAS changes course and heads straight for Earth.
I thought that if this apocalyptic and extremely unlikely scenario comes true, it will coincide with Halloween — and then I remembered that in previous year another (regular) comet appeared just before this unofficial holiday and was called the “Halloween Comet”. I decided to refresh my memory about it and searched for more information.
It was a surprise when I found that the “Halloween comets” are more than one! At this point things got a little bit strange and I decided to write this unplanned article (first for my bulgarian site - Комети за Хелоуин).
C/2024 S1 (ATLAS) was discovered on September 27, 2024 and passed its perihelion on October 28 — just before Halloween. Soon after, it disintegrates. By the way, to avoid any conspiracy theories, ATLAS-HKO is the name of the automatic observatory in Hawaii which discovered both 3I/ATLAS and C/2024 S1, that’s why its name appeared in both comets names. There is no strange coincidence there.
C/2025 A6 (Lemmon) was discovered on January 3th this year and just a few days ago it reached its closest point to Earth. So it, too, can be called a “Halloween comet”. Well, if 3I/ATLAS happens to pull a stunt soon, it might snatch that title.
And now — are you ready for the most interesting “Halloween comet”? It is 2P/Encke. It is a periodic comet — meaning it is observed repeatedly at definite intervals. The previous two comets I mentioned are non-periodic — that is, they just pass once. The period of 2P/Encke is 3.3 years, which means that it rarely (almost never) coincides with Halloween.
Why then did I call it the “Halloween comet”? Because it is believed to be the cause of the appearance of two meteor showers — the Taurids (occuring around Halloween) and the Beta Taurids (June–July). I am sure you know — during meteor showers we can observe falling “shooting stars”, and the Taurids, at least if one trusts what is written on the internet, also produce larger “falling fireballs”. All of this is due to small meteorites burning up in the atmosphere.
I decided that now everything was clear — simply C/2024 S1 and C/2025 A6 are larger rocky fragments from the Taurids and it is perfectly normal for them to approach us and the Sun around Halloween. A coincidence. Nothing more! Well, I was wrong.
C/2024 S1 (ATLAS) had an orbit very close to the Sun and a high inclination (~142°) and a perihelion of only ~0.008 AU. C/2025 A6 (Lemmon) has an inclination of ~143° with respect to the ecliptic. The Taurid shower and the comet 2P/Encke have orbital elements different from the unusual orbits of the above two comets. Well then, tell me — what is the probability that around an ancient pagan holiday with distinctly mystical elements there appear a meteor shower, two unrelated comets, and one strange interstellar visitor such as 3I/ATLAS?!
But wait — I’m not done yet with 2P/Encke. While I was searching for additional information I came across a strange scientific theory. According to it, 2P/Encke is the cause of the appearance of… the swastika! As you may know, this is an ancient symbol that appeared long before it was adopted by the Nazis. According to some researchers, during one of its passes near Earth, 2P/Encke had multiple tails and individual fragments and seeing this in the sky, the ancient people created the symbol known today as the swastika.
What’s going on here?! A pagan mystical holiday, comets, swastikas, alien ships. It could not be a better mash for Halloween! 😄
Alas, let me calm the passions a little. October 31 is not the only date with an unusual clustering of cosmic events.
August 12-13 is even more loaded. Here are the meteor showers, four simultaneously!
Perseids — the great annual spectacle, peak on 12–13 August.
Alpha Capricornids — active until about 12–13 August.
Southern δ-Aquariids — strong at end of July, still active during the first half of August.
Kappa Cygnids — active 3–28 August, peak in the middle of the month, produce occasional bright meteors.
And here are the comets:
C/1964 N1 (Ikeya). This comet reached its closest point to Earth on August 12, 1964.
141P/Machholz. Discovered on August 13, 1994 by Donald Machholz.
And unlike Halloween, for August 12-13 at least I don’t know of any ancient pagan rituals associated with it.
OK, I admit — if you search the Internet you will find some. But they either died out long ago (Greek-Thracian festivals of Artemis and Bendis) or are not nearly as popular and mystical as Halloween. And I’m sure any day of the year can be linked to some old festival. So my conclusion remains valid — there is a clustering of cosmic events around days other than Halloween. So everything may be just a coincidence, really...JUST COINCIDENCE!
Still, the last word will belong to 3I/ATLAS, it might really become fun soon! Trick or treat?
