[vsnet-chat 1469] Re: question about Sct N81

[bas@lowell.Lowell.Edu (Brian Skiff)]

     The published observational record seems to consist of only two notices
on IAU Circulars, numbers 3566 and 3571, which can be read via the CBAT
Web site.
     IAUC 3566 has this entry:


PROBABLE NOVA IN SCUTUM
     S. W. Milbourn and D. Saw, British Astronomical Association,
report that David Branchett, Eastleigh, Hampshire, England, has
found a probable nova, as shown below.  R. Wood, Royal Greenwich
Observatory, reports a confirmation and accurate position by R.
Argyle and E. Clements from an astrographic plate:

     1981 UT             R. A. (1950) Decl.       Mag.   Observer
     Jan. 18.26667    18 43.8       - 4 58         8     Branchett
          20.25833    18 44 11.7    - 4 59 56      9     Argyle

     J. Mattei, AAVSO, communicates an approximate visual magnitude
estimate by J. Morgan, Prescott, AZ: Jan. 20.57 UT, ~ 10.


...all of which sounds reasonable.  However, on IAUC 3571 we have:


BRANCHETT'S OBJECT IN SCUTUM
     Further observations have failed to confirm a nova in Scutum
(cf. IAUC 3566), and there is doubt that Morgan's magnitude estimate
refers to a new object.  R. Argy1e writes that the Jan. 20
observation, from a 4-min unfiltered IIa-O exposure with the 0.33-m
astrograph, refers to an object that is not on the Palomar Sky Survey.


This leaves the RGO exposure, which presumably can still be consulted---as can
Bob Argyle.  The evidence on the IAUCs, however, leads me to conclude there
was some sort of mis-identification involved, and that there was no nova
in Scutum in January 1981.

     If there's more to this story that helps confirm the existence of the
object, then it ought to be published somewhere.

\Brian

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