Images by other observatories confirmed this, including Hubble. When they looked at the comet in April 2020 they saw it sporting quite a grand tail, extending for about 600,000 kilometers, nearly twice the distance of the Moon from the Earth! Mind you, the nucleus the solid part of the comet is probably only about 4 kilometers across.
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Hubble image of the unusual comet P/2019 LD2, which is currently orbiting the Sun near Jupiter, but will soon be ejected from the solar system. Credit: NASA, ESA, and B. Bolin (Caltech)
Calculations show that around that time it was losing about 80 kilograms of water ice per second. It was also shedding gases like carbon monoxide (about 50 kilos/second), carbon dioxide (7 kilos/second) and diatomic carbon (two carbon atoms bound together; at a rate of 40 grams per second).
Arches of Chaos Could Enable Super-Fast Space Travel
Global arch-like structure of space manifolds in the Solar System. Image Credit: Sciencemag.org
Astronomers h
ave discovered dynamic channels or ‘aches of chaos’ within the solar system that could enable faster travel to both its inner and outer regions for future space missions.
A team of researchers led by Nataša Todorović, Astronomical Observatory Belgrade, Serbia, has found notable and unexpected manifold structures with the solar system. This architecture created by gravitational interactions in the fabric of space takes the form of a series of arches that spread out from the asteroid belt past Uranus and beyond.