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Comet Lovejoy. The comet's blue tail is so long, only 1/3rd of it fits in the space provided above. The whole thing stretches more than 7 million km from end to end. On Jan. 7th, Comet Lovejoy was at its closest to Earth: 0.47 astronomical units (70 million km) away. Although the comet will be moving away from us for the rest of the month, it will continue to grow in brightness because it is still moving closer to the sun.