Bright Supernova in NGC 4038/4039

[astroron (Ron)]

A bright supernova has been found in NGC 4038/4039, The Antenne galaxy.
It is bright as extra galactic supernovae go , at 12.8mag, it is visible in a 8"(20cm) scope, but who would look for it so far away from the visible galaxy.
It is in fact in the tail of NGC 4038 see picture.
Not much chance of observing this object due to the lousy weather we are having in South East Queensland

[fringe_dweller]

thats pretty cool Ron, must be a tough neighbourhood! thanks for posting

[Ric]

Thanks for the alert Ron, don't know if I'll get to see it with all this cloud but I hope I'll get a chance.

Cheers

[citivolus (Ric)]

I would have been happy just to see the moon tonight! That is sure way out there.

[iceman (Mike)]

The moon certainly won't help in seeing this, that's if it ever clears.
Thanks for the heads-up Ron.

[[1ponders] (Paul)]

Cheers Ron Would be nice if the night time clouds ever cleared up here

[ngcles]

Hi All,

Further to the above, I've learned this morning from Brian Skiff on another mailing list that preliminary spectra indicates it is a type Ia event (ie a detonating carbon-oxygen white dwarf star). Several reliable magnitude estimates place it between mag +12.8 and +13.0.

It is within the south tail of the Antennae Galaxy (NGC 4038-39) and the precise position is 12 01 52.80 -18 58 21.7 (J2000), about 5 arc-mins south of the main merged galaxy pair. 25cm sould see it pretty well from a dark site and in 20cm it will be a bit tougher.

If not for any other reason, once you have identified it, you can use it as a marker to locate where the S pointing streamer is, and then try to see the streamer itself -- a very, very difficult obserrvation but will now be right at the top of my list in a couple of weeks!

Best,

Les D
Contributing Editor
AS&T