------------------------------------------------------------------- THE ASTRONOMER Electronic Circular No 1524 2000 May 27 14.28UT 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 ------------------------------------------------------------------- COMET 2000 K1 F. Shelly, Lincoln Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, reports the discovery by LINEAR of a comet. Additional CCD observations have also been received following posting on the NEO Confirmation Page: 2000 UT R.A. (2000) Decl. m1 Observer May 26.31260 16 35 59.91 + 9 43 34.2 18.0 LINEAR 26.37246 16 35 56.66 + 9 44 00.8 17.7 " 26.84775 16 35 32.53 + 9 47 31.6 16.0 Ticha 26.85382 16 35 32.14 + 9 47 34.5 " 26.90561 16 35 29.49 + 9 47 56.8 Kusnirak 26.91633 16 35 28.94 + 9 48 01.4 " 26.93501 16 35 27.98 + 9 48 10.0 Galad 26.93671 16 35 27.89 + 9 48 10.7 14.9 " M. Blythe, F. Shelly, M. Bezpalko, M. Elowitz, and R. Manguso (Lincoln Laboratory ETS). 1.0-m f/2.15 reflector. Measurers J. Stuart, R. Sayer, and J. B. Evans. Tail in p.a. 160 deg. J. Ticha and M. Tichy (Klet). 0.57-m f/5.2 reflector. Coma diameter about 12" and wide 20" tail in p.a. 205 deg. P. Kusnirak (Ondrejov). 0.65-m f/3.6 refl. Broad tail about 2' long in p.a. 140 deg. A. Galad and J. Toth (Modra). 0.6-m f/5.5 reflector. Tail in p.a. about 160 deg. IAUC 7430 GAMMA RAY BURSTERS/GRO Following the discussions with NASA at Huntsville regarding future monitoring by amateurs of GRB's, as expected news has reached us that the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory is being shut down: Scott Barthelmy, NASA-GSFC reports: CGRO Flight Operations have turned off the science instruments on GRO at 2000 May 26.00 UT. The BATSE and COMPTEL instruments will no longer be in a mode to detect GRBs. BATSE will no longer be producing triggers, so there will be no more GCN/BATSE Notices (all types: Original, Final, MAXBC, LOCBURST, and lightcurves). COMPTEL will no longer be able produce COMPTEL Notices. With all 4 instruments turned off, the Flight Ops team will do a series of tests and, later, small burns to decrease the orbit altitude. Then on Jun 3 the final main burn will occur to bring the s/c into the Pacific ocean. It is the end of an extremely productive 9-year mission and the end of a set of still very capable scientific instruments. We are honoured to have been able to participate and we will miss its presence. The failure of the on-board tape recorders was genesis to GCN (then called BACODINE). GCN continues to live on with contributions from the current constellation of missions: BeppoSAX, RXTE, ALEXIS, Wind-KONUS, NEAR, and the IPN; and with the future missions: HETE2, INTEGRAL, and Swift. Guy M Hurst