Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9 probably destroyed before they even reached the cloud layer. The visible scars from the impacts could be seen on Jupiter for many months. They were extremely prominent, and observers described them as even more easily visible than the Great Red Spot. A search of historical observations revealed that the spots were probably the most prominent transient features ever seen on the planet, and that although the Great Red Spot is notable for its striking color, no spots of the size and darkness of those caused by the SL9 impacts have ever been recorded before. Spectroscopic observers found that ammonia and
Great January Comet of 1910 twilight, its noticeably curved tail reaching up to 50 degrees by early February. The year 1910 saw considerable media interest in the predicted return of Halley's Comet, which reached perihelion on April 20. The appearance of the Daylight Comet several months earlier therefore came as something of a surprise, and made an extremely strong impression on an expectant public; when Halley's Comet returned again in 1986, many older people's accounts of having seen it in 1910 clearly referred to the Daylight Comet instead. Owing to a "telephonic error", the comet was initially reported as being named Drake's Comet, though once