[vsnet-chat 3747] Nova Like star in the LMC

["Andrew Pearce" <arpearce@ozemail.com.au>]

I have been reporting a star with the designation - Dor, which is located in the
LMC, in my visual observations to vsnet-obs.  Naturally some people ask me what
star this actually is!  Mati Moreal has prepared an excellent chart for the VSS
RASNZ which is what I have been using.  The explanation for the star is given in
IBVS 2854 (written by J. FLOHRER and J. GREINER, Institut fur Kosmosforschung
Berlin):

"180 sky patrol plates of the years 1934-1938 and 1952-1953 existing in
the Sonneberg Observatory archive were examined for optical flashes in the
very small error box of the famous gamma ray burst of 5 March 1979 (GB790305).
This error box overlaps with the supernova remnant N49 in the Large Magellanic
Cloud. The exposure times of the plates range from 30 to 60 minutes giving a
limiting magnitude of the plates of 13.5m. No optical event in the gamma
burst source GBS 0526- 66 could be found.

There was, however, a flash-like event on the plate 722 of 17 Dec. 1952
at the position alpha(1950)= 5h27m47s+-4s, delta(1950)=-66deg06'45"+-30" (on the
charts 44V and 42B of Hodge and Wright, The Large Magellanic Cloud, Smithsonian
Press, 1967, there are two or three stars at this position which are
just separated on the charts but not at all on our plates, cf. Fig. 1.). The
optical flash reached   11.5m and the limiting magnitude of the respective
plate is   12.5m. The brightness of the possible eruptive star declined
during the following, weeks up to 10 Febr. 1953 to the pre-outburst level of
  13 with some fluctuations superimposed. The star also seems to reach the
brightness of   12.5m on plates of Nov.-Dec. 1937 and Jan.-Feb. 1938.
  Unfortunately the photographic brightness of the suspected images is
near the limiting magnitude of the plates examined. So we cannot conclude
with certainty if the possible variability is real or else caused by a
statistical effect of e.g. grain noise."

So it may be only a rough chance to be recurrent, but it is located in a nice
area of the LMC close to RY Dor, so I'll keep an eye on it!

I'd be interested to know if this star has received any kind of designation, so
we don't have to keep referring to it as - Dor!

Cheers
Andrew

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