Well the core of it is not really that large, only about 2.2 miles in diameter. The gas cloud is what is huge. What amazes me is that something so small could produce that sizable a gas volume. Consider that the sun is approximately 870000 miles in diameter. That means the comet's gas volume has expanded to 395454.5455 times it's core diameter, or approx 3.954x10^5. A 5th magnitude increase is nothing to sneeze at.
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