Comet 3I/ATLAS, the interstellar interloper currently zipping through our solar system, cannot easily be observed from Earth right now, because it is on the other side of the solar system. The sun is not directly blocking the view, but trying to make out a dim comet within the daytime glare is nigh impossible.

But Mars is also on that side of the solar system right now, and spacecraft there have been able to photograph the comet, which is just the third object known to have come from elsewhere in the Milky Way galaxy.

On Tuesday, the European Space Agency released a short movie of images that one of its spacecraft, the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter, took on Saturday as the comet made its closest approach to Mars.

The images successfully captured a bright dot of the comet moving among the mo

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