lost my heads up here ? anyway a new Super nova , spotted in M95 , last time I posted this , it was mag. 12.9 . last seen under mag .12. Around 5 hours ago I put a SV Alert .. on this . ...
Brian
HI All,
for anyone who would like to see a bright supernova visually, try the latest bright one that was found on March 16th in M95 (NGC3351) which is in Leo, and is currently about 1 degree south-east of Mars.
This is brightening very quickly, and so is likely to be brighter over the next few days before it levels off. Its a type IIP, which means it's a single huge explosion, and the 'P' means it will have a plateau phase that will maintain it's unusual brightness for months to come.
I measured the brightness of new SN to be about magnitude 13.3, so it should be visible in telescopes with mirrors of 8" or more under dark skies.
Also worth noting is another bright supernova in NGC4790 in Virgo (about 4 deg from Sombrero Galaxy). SN2012au is at mag 13.3 (possibly still on the way up?), but very close to the host galaxy's nucleus. Perhaps big telescopes can separate the two?
It is sitting a fair way from the core of the galaxy, only vis with AV under my light polluted skies in the 12" but at 150x it is a nice little point that is quite obvious.
Low power won't work with this, at 88x it was on the edge of visibility.
I think thre is a bit of high moisture/clouds here that is dimming the view as the galaxy is really dim.
As I suspected transparency is a bit dodgy down here tonight (now there's a surprise!!) cruised over to the Triplet and NGC 3628 was invisible with no structure apparent in M65 and M66. Also looked for M104 and nowhere near as bright as on Monday night.
If we get a clear night at SV the SN will be nice and bright.
It seems that here in SE Qld, or anywhere in Qld, we don't have stars anymore, just clouds and rain, or just clouds...
My image of the SN in M95 above is only 3 x 30 second images combined that were captured in a 2 minute gap between clouds drifting through, and I had to close the roof after the last 30 second subframe was finished due to rain on the roof again...
Managed a rare evening shoot tonight and very pleased to get it! Hopefully I'll get to eyeball it at Snake Valley this weekend, if some charitable person will grant me a view!
209x was some more structure of m95 but nothing seen out to s/n...cranked up to 530x with bluryness of m95 core but had that and s/n on edge of eyepiece in focus nice sight to see........
We have a dedicated forum for Observing Reports, It would be appreciated if observers of the Supernova would post their observations there.
We have two threads going on this
Cheers
PS Brian you put your Supernova Alert on the observational and visual Astronomy.
lost my heads up here ? anyway a new Super nova , spotted in M95 , last time I posted this , it was mag. 12.9 . last seen under mag .12. Around 5 hours ago I put a SV Alert .. on this . ..
.
really how cool thanks 
