A star known as HIP 85605 is on a collision course with our solar system. Not a collision course as in Armageddon, or When Worlds Collide, but rather on a path to come within 0.04 parsecs of the Sun. That might seem close, but that would make it more than 8,000 times more distant than Earth at its closest approach (8,000 AU). Distant Eris is only 100 AU by comparison. Given that stellar distances are typically measured in light years, and this encounter would be only 50 light days away, that’s remarkably close by astronomical standards. This close encounter won’t occur for another 400000 years or so. Currently HIP 85605 is about 16 light years away, so we have time to plan for its visit. But it does raise an interesting question as to how such a close encounter could affect our solar system.
One thing we know for sure is it won’t significantly affect planetary orbits. Through computer simulations of the solar system, we find that orbits of the inner planets remain stable over billions of years even with stellar interactions as close as 0.01 parsecs. The most outer bodies such as Pluto and Eris are less stable, but on the whole planetary orbits are stable against all but nearly direct stellar hits.