Hubble Space Telescope photographs Comet 252P/LINEAR, one of the closest encounters for Earth

It was one of the few rare close calls Earth had ever had, as comet 252P/LINEAR buzzed past the earth at a distance of about 3.3 million kilometers. Just to understand that better - about 14 times the distance between Earth and the moon.

Hubble Space Telescope took a series of photographs of the 252P, revealing that the comet had a rotating tail. Astronomers concluded that quite like spinning lawn sprinklers, water vapour was being blasted from the nucleus of the comet, launching dust-like ice particles into space.

Comet 252P/LINEAR will come into the inner solar system once again in 2021, but will not come anywhere close to Earth, NASA reported.

Check out the video here: