------------------------------------------------------------------- THE ASTRONOMER Electronic Circular No 1054 1996 Feb 27 18.26UT Ed:Guy M Hurst, 16,Westminster Close, Kempshott Rise, Basingstoke, Hants, RG22 4PP,England. Telephone/FAX(0256)471074 Int:+44256471074 INTERNET: GUY@TAHQ.DEMON.CO.UK GMH at AST.STAR.RL.AC.UK WORLD WIDE WEB http://www.demon.co.uk/astronomer ------------------------------------------------------------------- SUPERNOVA 1996C IN MCG +8-25-47 J. Mueller reports her discovery of a supernova (mag about 18) on a IV-N plate taken on Feb. 15 UT by K. M. Rykoski and herself with the 1.2-m Oschin Schmidt telescope in the course of the second Palomar Sky Survey. SN 1996C is located 14" north of the centre of MCG +08-25-047 (R.A. = 13h50m.8, Decl. = +49o20'; equinox 2000.0). No object appears at this position on original Palomar Sky Survey prints or on second Sky Survey transparencies. IAUC 6317 SUPERNOVA 1996D IN NGC 1614 L. Drissen, C. Robert, Y. Dutil, and J.-R. Roy, Departement de Physique, Universite Laval, report the discovery of a supernova on an image and spectrogram obtained at the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope on Feb. 9. A preliminary inspection of the partially- calibrated data by A. V. Filippenko (University of California at Berkeley) suggested that this might be a type-Ic supernova. SN 1996D is located in a spiral arm, about 6".6 east of the bright nucleus of NGC 1614 (R.A. = 4h34m.0, Decl. = -8o35', equinox 2000.0). This new source is not visible in previous images, the latest known being a Hubble Space Telescope WFPC2 image (F606W) collected on 1994 Dec. 11. IAUC 6317 GK PERSEI (=Q1996/011) Recent observations suggest that this old nova may be brightening: 1996 Feb 16.892UT, 13.0 (G.Hurst, Basingstoke, 0.44-m refl.) 24.515UT, 13.0 (M.Nakatani, Japan) 26.050UT, 12.4 (J.McKenna, USA) 26.463UT, 12.39(D.Nogami, Ouda, 0.60-m+CCD+V) 26.918UT, 12.5 (G.Hurst) These results do not yet conclusively confirm a full brightening but observers are strongly urged to monitor the star closely and report results to the Editor. Guy M Hurst