------------------------------------------------------------------- THE ASTRONOMER Electronic Circular No 2271 2006 Oct 09 19.00UT 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 Backup: gmh@wdcc1.bnsc.rl.ac.uk WORLD WIDE WEB http://www.theastronomer.org ------------------------------------------------------------------- GRB 061007 AND BRIGHT OPTICAL COUNTERPART Further to the announcement on TA E-Circular 2271, David Bersier et. al., Liverpool John Moores University reports on GCN 5709 that the optical counterpart of GRB 061007 has been observed with the 2-m Faulkes Telescope South at Siding Spring. At 142 sec after trigger time, they measured a magnitude of mR=10.15 +/- 0.04 (calibration based on USNOB1 R2 mag, which may introduce a 0.3 mag systematic uncertainty). When compared to the magnitude measured by ROTSE (m=13.6, GCN 5706), this implies a substantial brightening in the first 2.5 minutes (more than a factor of 10 between 26 and 142 seconds). From 142s on, the OT is seen to decay. For the next three hours, the decay followed a power law with an index of about -1.55 +/- 0.05. The position of the afterglow is: RA 03h 05m 19.56s DEC -50 30'2.7" +/- 1.2" (2000) COMET 29P/SCHWASSMANN-WACHMANN 2 Mark Kidger e-mails: Following on the reports of outbursts of 29P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 2 on recent e-circulars it is worth noting that the comet is proving to be much more active this observing season than in 2005/06. The amplitudes are still smaller than in most recent years, but there have already been four significant outbursts since the start of July. The base level of the light curve out of outburst is higher than in 2005/06, but still low compared to the level from 2002-2005. Despite some reports to the contrary, the outburst in early September was a rather small one. Right now 29P is in an interesting double outburst with an initial maximum on October 2nd at about the same level as the September outburst and then a second and much larger maximum on October 5th. This though is still a smaller maximum than the big one in mid-July that reached the highest level observed since December 2004. Guy M Hurst