Comet Hyakutake, seen here in March 1996, was the second comet Yuji Hyakutake discovered in less than two months. Credit: E. Kolmhofer, H. Raab; Johannes-Kepler-Observatory, Linz, Austria (http://www.sternwarte.at), CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
Having witnessed Comet Ikeya-Seki as a child in 1965, Japanese amateur astronomer Yuji Hyakutake was eager to discover a comet himself. And on Dec. 26, 1995, he did so, searching the skies with 25×150 binoculars and spotting Comet C/1955 Y1.
Comet C/1955 Y1 would also come to be known as Comet Hyakutake 2 – because only about a month later, on Jan. 30, 1996, Hyakutake would spot C/1996 B2, or Comet Hyakutake. Comet Hyakutake would attract significant public attention, as it approached within 9.3 million miles of Earth – its closest approach was March 25 – and was visible for 100 days, with a stunning tail that extended 20 million miles.
