------------------------------------------------------------------- THE ASTRONOMER Electronic Circular No 1178 1997 Mar 30 11.24UT Ed:Guy M Hurst, 16,Westminster Close, Kempshott Rise, Basingstoke, Hants, RG22 4PP,England.Telephone/FAX(01256)471074Int:+441256471074 INTERNET: GUY@TAHQ.DEMON.CO.UK GMH at AST.STAR.RL.AC.UK WORLD WIDE WEB http://www.demon.co.uk/astronomer ------------------------------------------------------------------- AQ CMI (Q1997/026) Jochen Pietz, Germany reports that he has observed an outburst of the SU UMa-type dwarf nova AQ CMi which is on the recurrent objects list of the UK Nova/Supernova Patrol. This is only the second time it has been seen visually since its discovery: 1997 Mar 28.88UT, 14.5v. Gary Poyner, Birmingham, England has reported confirmation: 1997 Mar 29.839UT, 14.3v (0.40-m reflector, sequence VSNET). Taichi Kato, Japan adds: AQ CMi was discovered as a possible dwarf nova by Morgenroth (AN 251, 326, 1934) who recorded the star in outburst on three plates between JD 2427155 and 2427160 (1933 March). Downes and Shara (1993) identifed AQ CMi with a very faint object of 19-20 mag. Recent spectroscopy by Zwitter et al. revealed the CV nature of this counterpart. The first ever outburst since the discovery was independently detected by J. Pietz on 1996 Feb. 10 visually (TA E-Circular 1047:Editor) and by R. U. Claudi on 1996 Feb. 9 spectroscopically (vsnet-alert 324). Subsequent photoelectric photometry by A. Shambrook at CTIO (communicated by J. Patterson, vsnet-obs 2105, vsnet-alert 327) and CCD photometry by D. Nogami (vsnet-alert 328) independently detected superhumps with a period of 95.9 and 95.4 min, respectively. An e-chart and sequence were provided on E1048. EDITORIAL ABSENCE/COMET DEADLINE The Editor will be away and not contactable from Wednesday Apr 3 to Sunday Apr 6. During that period please contact Martin Mobberley, Assistant Editor, if there are any discovery alerts. E-mails can be sent to him at: 100413.760@compuserve.com but please also copy any correspondence to the Editor's mailbox on Demon. The enormous workload associated with reports relating to Comet Hale-Bopp has meant that despite daily efforts to clear the backlog currently only observations received up until Mar 17 have been processed. The Editor will attempt to clear remaining e-mails before his departure but observers should regard the deadline for comets in respect of the April TA only as 1997 April 1. Guy M Hurst