Suggestions by Harvard professors that the interstellar rock Oumuamua could be part of an alien spaceship have been rubbished by a top British expert. “There really is no evidence to support this theory – it is pure speculation,” says Dr Jim Stonker of the Bedford Institute of Sanitary Engineering, who has his own theory as to the true nature of the strange shaped asteroid which has recently passed through the solar system. “Its shape – long and thin – and its colour – reddish brown – clearly suggest that it is a huge interplanetary turd, floating through space after being expelled from some gigantic alien creature.” Writing in the International Journal of Sewerage and Waste Disposal, Stonker claims that giant floating space turds are not uncommon and that astronomers have known about them for decades. “When you think about, their existence is quite obvious – if life is as common in the universe as these scientists think that is, then they’ll inevitably ejecting huge amounts of crap from their spaceships,” he claims. “What’s unusual about Oumuamua is its sheer size – it is several miles long, implying that whatever excreted it is also huge.” The sanitary engineer – who has contributed to the design of waste disposal systems for several NASA projects – has speculated that the huge turd might not have been ejected from a giant spaceship, but rather from some colossal space dwelling alien life form. “It is perfectly possible that such creatures exist – like Galactus, perhaps, from the Marvel comics, I’d imagine that he’d be taking some huge dumps after he’s eaten a few planets” he muses. “Or maybe it is some kind of space whale that can exist in the vacuum of space, scooping up cosmic dust, like plankton.”

According to Stonker, the existence of these space clinkers has been kept secret from the public by the authorities so as to avoid widespread panic. “Can you imagine the chaos which would ensue if people thought that there was an imminent danger of the earth colliding with a massive turd?” he says. “Sure, they might be softer than a regular rocky meteor, but imagine the splash if one managed to hit a major city? People would be engulfed in excrement, thousands could drown in it! Even if the thing broke up in the atmosphere, it could still spread shit over a huge area – there could be brown rain for days afterward. And don’t forget, this wouldn’t be ordinary shit – which would pose a massive health risk in its own right – but alien shit full of God knows what!” As it is, hundreds of space turds fall on the earth every day, but are so small that they burn up in the atmosphere, Stonker explains, adding that it is only a matter of time before a much larger piece of interstellar excrement finds itself on a collision course with the planet. Consequently, he is calling for the United Nations (UN) to instigate a space defence system to intercept and eliminate any such floating threats. “As a priority, they should be looking into launching some kind of giant toilet brush into orbit, with which we can try to break up any giant turds detected approaching the atmosphere,” he opines. “In the longer term, I’d propose the creation of some sort of space borne ‘pooper scooper’, which can deflect these things away from earth and toward the sun, where they will be burned up.”

Despite being widely ridiculed in the scientific community, Stonker’s theories have found support with some members of the public. “There’s plenty of evidence to support the idea of giant space jobbies,” noted amateur astronomer Kevin Kurloff – who has been published in the East Lewisham Astronomical Exchange and Mart – told The Sleaze. “Indeed, it isn’t a new idea – let’s not forget Erich von Scharn’s Skid Marks of the Gods? which argued the case for the earth having been used as an intergalactic rest stop by ancient aliens. His book contains plenty of evidence of ancient Mayan paintings showing alien astronauts sitting on high tech toilets.” Kurloff even claims to have first hand experience of alien excrement falling to earth. “Some of them are large enough that they don’t completely burn up in the atmosphere and enough of then can sometimes reach the surface to leave their mark. So to speak,” he says. “I once came out of my house to find my car covered in a layer of shit – it was still warm, so it must only have struck the vehicle minutes before. Another time, I found that my front door had been spattered with shit in an overnight meteor strike.” Kurloff, a secondary school teacher in his ‘day job’, dismisses suggestions that he was, in fact, the victim of pranks played by local vandals. “There is no way that any human agency could have deposited that amount of crap on my car,” he insists. “Likewise, the force with which that crap hit my door could only have been the result of a meteor strike.”

Objections to Stonker’s theories have come from another source, with many science fiction fans pointing out that it is scientifically and technically highly unlikely. “These supposed giant jobbies flying around space are completely implausible – everyone knows that the sort of technologically advanced civilisations which would be capable of achieving interstellar travel would have completely eliminated the need for defecation,” Tommy Poopley, editor of Star Trek fanzine Core Breach told the recent Hemel Hempsted Comicon. “After all, have you ever seen a toilet on any Federation star ship? Or seen any of the bridge crew saying tat they have to go for a dump? Of course not – in the future science will have found a way for us to eliminate such unpleasant bodily functions. It is quite clear that not even a race as crude as the Klingons – whose very name implies poor toilet hygiene, incidentally – are seen even to fart. Consequently, I reject this idea that there are spaceships flying around flushing out huge quantities of excrement!”

Poopley’s opinions have not gone unchallenged, with top Doctor Who fan Iris Chuffer arguing that just because toilets are not depicted in classic science fiction, it doesn’t mean that they don’t exist in the future. “For all we know, in Star Trek they might simply have developed a way to beam the crap directly out of their intestines onto the surfaces of nearby planets,” she told the same Comicon. “Or, more likely, they simply do what any desperate traveller does and beam down to planets themselves for a quick crap behind some bushes.” Chuffer also pointed out that although, in Doctor Who, the Time Lords are a fantastically advanced civilisation, having mastered time travel, still equipped their Tardises with toilets. “Series Ten made reference to this,” she says. “Although it didn’t specify whetherthese were ‘temporal toilets’, sending their contents either back into the distant past or forward into the far future – perhaps the ‘End of Time’ is the result of the universe being completely clogged with temporally displaced shit.”