Thunderchild Supernova

[PeterM]

Congratulations to Brendan Downs of Thunderchild Observatory on his discovery of a magnitude 17.3 Supernova in IC4854 in the early hours of Sunday morning.

Catalogued as 2010dc, this is Brendan's 2nd Supernova after a long drought. As I have noted before it doesn't surprise me that he has another and I predict there will be many more, much quicker. He now has the equipment, but more importantly he has the passion and support to be even more successful.

Three cheers Brendan, the monopoly has been broken, for now.... (hehe).

More details can be found here.

http://www.rochesterastronomy.org/snimages/

PeterM.

[jjjnettie]

Excellent! Fantastic news Peter.
Huge congratulations Brendan.:D
Don't forget to bring the white marker to AF.

[DavidU]

That's great ! How much patience would you have to have?
Well done.

[[1ponders]]

Congratulations Brenden. What fantastic news!! Well deserved:clap: :clap:


Thanks for the news Peter.

[thunderchildobs]

I must thank Peter Marples, Greg Bock, Colin Drescher, Pat Pearl, Stu Parker (members of BOSS, Backyard Observatory Supernova Search team) and Berto Monard for help with confirming the discovery and doing all the reporting.

The image shows IC 4854 and the supernova 2010dc.

The image was taken with a very new 14inch Meade ACF OTA (4 months old), and very old ST-7 (15 years old) and was 60 seconds exposure time.

It has been nearly 13 years since my first supernova, 1997de at the Qld astrofest. It means I get to bore friends with a new story.

And yes I will be bringing a white pen to the astrofest to updated the score sheet.

[renormalised]

Great discovery:)

Congratulations...let's hope it's not quite as long between drinks before you bag your next one:)

[RB]

Congratulations Brendan, well done on your discovery !

:thumbsup: :thumbsup:

[Dennis]

Well done Brendan – a terrific result for all your patient hours logged in looking for these extraordinary stellar events!

Cheers

Dennis

[DavidTrap]

Well done Brendan - shows a degree of dedication that few will comprehend...

DT

[AstroJunk]

Very well done Brendan :thumbsup:

[CometGuy]

Fantastic news Brendan. Good to see you giving Marples and Parker some competition :)

Terry

[h0ughy]

Absolutely fantastic news brendan

[astroron]

Great News Brendan:thumbsup:, is this one all your own:question:
Fantastic effort:)

[ngcles]

Hi Peter & All,

Great news and congratulations to Brendan -- well done mate!


Best,

Les D

[thunderchildobs]

This one is not shared, it's all mine.

[firstlight]

I'll echo all the congratulations in this thread. Persistance pays (and the 'scope shops accept the payment :D).

Bag a couple more and we can cover the plastic in the Dining Room.

[multiweb]

Congrats! :thumbsup: Terrific how you guys pick up those tiny specks.

[peterl]

Well done Brendan.. :)
persistence pays off. keep up the good work.

Peter.

[jjjnettie]

:D :thumbsup:

[thunderchildobs]

I downloaded images of the 6000 galaxies in my search from the Digitized Sky Survey (DSS) (9gig of data at dial up, took 3 weeks).

When I take an image, I visual compare it to the DSS image and to a existing image I have. I know others who blink compare their images.

Remember you do not have to check the entire field, but only the region around the galaxy. (But I do look for any stray fuzziness just in case there is comet passing through). In this case the supernova stood out like a sore thumb. (How a mag 17.2 star stands out is an interesting concept). I probably noticed the supernova in under 10 seconds.

Brendan

[Outbackmanyep]

Well done! Great work!

[PeterM]

Brendan is now an official "Media ...." well you know what I mean. Page 6 today's Courier Mail. Some people will do anything to get in the papers.

PeterM;

[jjjnettie]

:D Cheers Peter.
I'll buy my copy today.

[thunderchildobs]

I got a phone call from 97.3FM at 5:35am to see if I wanted to talk about the supernova. I did the interview a few minutes later while still half a sleep and in bed.

I have also got an interview with Mark Sulu, Channel 10 Brisbane on thursday. Watch the Brisbane 5:00pm news tommorrow.

[thunderchildobs]

The interview did make it on the news.

[jjjnettie]

Sorry I missed it Brendan, I don't have telly...as such.

[thunderchildobs]

The interview can be seen at

http://ten.com.au/video-player.htm?vxSiteId=cb519624-44a2-4bf7-808b-3514d34e96e4&vxChannel=ENVIRONMENT&vxClipId=2683_news-nova-030610&vxBitrate=300&vxTemplate=integrated.swf&vxClickToPlay=false

[DavidTrap]

Great publicity for the hobby Brendan.

DT

[lesbehrens]

hi. good find:eyepop:. every one at work keeps talking to me about it. u r very famous in Ipswich.

[thunderchildobs]

I also made the front page of the Queensland Times, (local Ipswich paper) and page 8 on Saturday.

When I walked into the local newsagent, the owner saw me and asked "How many copies (of the paper) are you buying".

Brendan